Rethinking God as gift: Marion, Derrida, and the limits of phenomenology 9780823221226, 9780823221219, 9780823221233

Table of contents :
Frontmatter
Acknowledgments (page vii)
Introduction (page ix)
1 The Problem of the Gift (page 1)
2 Husserl and Heidegger (page 19)
3 Levinas (page 45)
4 Refiguring Givenness (page 81)
5 Being Given (page 115)
6 The Limits of Phenomenology (page 153)
7 Rethinking the Gift I (page 184)
8 Rethinking the Gift II (page 198)
Epilogue: Naming the Gift, Giving a Name, Rethinking God As Gift (page 241)
Select Bibliography (page 249)
Index of Names (page 265)
Index of Subjects (page 267)

Citation preview

Rethinking God As Gift

PERSPECTIVES IN CONTINENTAL PHILOSOPHY

John D. Caputo, Series Editor 1. John D. Caputo, ed., Deconstruction in a Nutshell: A Conversation with Jacques Dernda.

2. Michael Strawser, Both/And: Reading Kierkegaard—trom Trony to Fedtfication.

3. Michael Barber, Ethical Hermeneutics: Rationality in Enrique Disssel’s Philosophy of Liberation.

4. James H. Olthuis, ed., Knowing Other-wise: Philosophy at the Threshold of Spirituality. 5. James Swindal, Reflection Revisited: fiirgen Habermas's Discursive Theory of truth.

6. Richard Kearney, Poetics of Imagining: Modern and Postmodern.

second edition. 7. Thomas W. Busch, Circulating Beng: From Limbodiment to Incorporation—Kssays on Late Existentialism. 8. Edith Wyschogrod, Emmanuel Levinas: The Problem of Ethical Metaphysics. Second edition.

9. Francis J. Ambrosio, ed., fhe Question of Christian Philosophy Today.

10. Jeffrey Bloechl, ed., The Face of the Other and the Trace of God, Essays on the Philosophy of Emmanuel Levinas.

11. Ise N. Bulhof and Laurens ten Kate, eds, Flight of the Gods: Philosophical Perspectives on Negative Theology.

12. Trish Glazebrook, Heidegger's Philosophy of Science. 13. Kevin Hart, The Trespass of the Sign. Second edition. 14. Mark C. Taylor, Journeys to Selfhood: Hegel and Kierkegaard, Second edition.

15. Dominique Janicaud, Jean-Francois Courtine, Jean-Louis Chrétien, Michel Henry, Jean-Luc Marton, and Paul Ricoeur, Phenemenology and the “Theological Turn”: The Prench Debate. 16. Karl Jaspers, The Question of German Guilt. Introduction by Joseph W. Koterski, S.J.

17. Jean-Luc Marion, The Idol and Distance: Five Studies, Translated

with an introduction by Thomas A. Carlson. 18. Jeffrey Dudiak, The Intrigue of Ethics: A Reading of the idea of Discourse in the Thought of Hmunanuel Levinas.

Rethinking God As Gitt MARION, DERRIDA, AND THE LIMITS OF PHENOMENOLOGY

ROBYN HORNER

Fordham University Press New York 2001

Copynght © 2001 by Fordham University Press

All nghts reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored ina retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means—electronic, mechanical, photocopy, recording, or any othcr—except for brief quotations in printed reviews, without the prior permission of the publisher. Perspectives in Continental Philosophy No. 19 ISSN LORG-3958

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Horner, Robyn. Rethinking God as gift: Marion, Derrida, and the limits of phenomenology / Robyn Horner. p. cm. — (Perspectives in continental philosophy, ISSN 1089-3938 ; no. 193

lncludes bibliographical relerences and index. ISBN 0-825 2-2 121-0 — ISBN 0-8232-2122-9 (pbk)

l. God. 2. Gtfts—Relimious aspects—Christiinity. 3, Marion, Jean-Lic, 1946—Contributions in religious aspects of gifts. 4, Derrida, Jacques—Contnibutions in religious aspects of gifts. 5. Phenomenologicat

theology. [. Title. IL Series. BT55.H67 2001

231.7—de2] 2001018931 Printed in the United States of America

Ol 02 03 OF 05 5 4 3 2 1 First Eclitron

CONTENTS

Acknowledgments Vil

Introduction 1X

1 The Problem of the Gift | 2 Husserl and Heidegger 19 4 Refiguring Givenness 3]

3 Levinas 45

56 TheBeing Given 115 Limits of Phenomenology 133

7 Rethinking the Gift I 184 8 Rethinking the Gilt I 198

God As Gift 24] Select Bibliography 249

Epilogue: Naming the Gill, Giving a Name, Rethinking

Index of Names 265

Index of Subjects 267

This Page Intentionally Left Blank

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS A volume such as this is never the result of just one person’s labor.

It is made possible in the first place by the hard work of many who have already risked themselves in print, those who have entered into long and serious discussions, and others who might have simply prompted moments of insight in conversation over a meal. But it is also enabled by the belief and commitment of those

who offer encouragement and support, and the preparedness of family and friends to tolerate, on the part of the author, preoccupation, anxiety, doubt, dreams, and domestic disorganization in order to make it happen. This book bears the traces of many people: colleagues, advisers, mentors, family, and friends, a few of whom I name here, in the knowledge that there are many others who go unnamed, and others still whom [ do not even know: Kevin Hart; John D. Caputo; Michael Fagenblat; Thomas A. Carlson; Jean-Luc Marion; Tony Kelly; Joseph S. O'Leary; Anthony Chiffolo; Jonathan Lawrence; Thomas Doyle; Mark Reynolds; my colleagues and students at Monash University in Melbourne, including Mark Manolopoulos; Peter Howard, Damian Whelan, and Meg Gilfedder; my family, especially my parents, Les and June Horner; Julie Morgan; and Bosco Rowland. Earlier versions of some sections of this book appeared in: “Derrida and Goad: Opening a Conversation,” Pacifica: Journal of the Melbourne College of Divinity 12, no. 1 (February 1999): 12-26; and

“Emmanuel Levinas: God and Philosophy—Practical Implicatious for Ghristian Theology,” Philosophy in the Contemporary World

7, no. 1 (Spring 2000); 41-46,

This Page Intentionally Left Blank

INTRODUCTION But God, who is rich in mercy, out of the great love with

which he loved us even when we were dead through our trespasses, mace us alive together with Christ—by vrace you have been saved—and raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places m Christ

Jesus, so that in the ages to come he might show the immeasurable riches of his grace in kindness toward us

in Christ Jesus. For by grace you have been saved through faith, and this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God—not the result of works, so that no one may

boast (Eph. 2:4-9).

IN CHRISTIAN THEOLOGY, the way in which the relationship be-

tween God and human beings 1s accomplished 1s frequently described as gift. It is God’s self-gift that initiates this relationship, facilitates it, and enables it to be sustained. This ts the meaning of grace: that God 1s for the world giver, gift, and giving, a trinity of self-emptying love who is beyond all imagining, and that in this gift what seems like an impossible relationship is made possible. So it is suggested in the letter to the Ephesians, that relationship with God—which is the very meaning of salvation—is made posstble only because of God’s mercifulness and love (“God, who ts

rich in mercy, out of the great love with which he loved us... made us alive ...). The initiative and the capacity to achieve relationship lie totally with God (“this ts not your own doing”), and the movement toward relationship is seen to be motivated not by justice (which is essentially a moment of recuperation— justice tries to restore a certain balance to the scales) but by a merciful love that is pure expenditure (“so that in the ages to come he might show the immeasurable riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus’). The movement toward relation-

ship is made without the motivation of return. In other words,

x RETHINKING GOD AS GIFT relationship with God (salvation) occurs in the self-offering of God, which cloes not hinge on any condition. The gift of God is pure as tt is perfect and absolute. To speak of God as gift is theologically compelling, not least because it appeals to a particular aspeci of Christian experience: if it 1s possible at all to describe an “encounter” with God, tt will be one that is utterly gracious, impossible to predict, manipulate, or objectify—sheer gift. And yet here we begin to glimpse the problem that motivates the writing of this book, For how might such a gift—pure, absolute, unable to be objectified—hbe received? The problem of God's self-giving has a number of faces. We are

immediately referred to the whole question of human experience, which resonates in many registers and will of necessity be treated here within particular limits. The more strictly theological angle on this question is well worn but no less pressing for being repeated: if God is utterly greater than that which human experience can contain, how is God to enter into that experience at all? But in this context a further question arises that will serve as the

prism through which the previous questions will be examined: the question of the gift itself. Significant in the passage from Ephesians noted above is the unconditionality of the gift, and even momentary reflection on a common understanding of the word “gift” reveals that unconditionality is one of its most impor-

tant conditions. If I give expecting something in return, I have not really given in the right spirit. But unconditionality extends further than not intending that the gift be returned; it extends to the fact of tts not being returned or even returnable, Few theologtans would contest that God’s gift 1s too great to be returned, and therefore the difficulty does not seem to apply in this instance. Yet there is an argument emerging trom the work of Jacques Derrida,

and yet to be fully articulated or tested here, to suggest that no gift that is recognized as such in the present is ever given unconditionally because such a gift is always and inevitably returned. In my receiving the gift as a gift, the gift is undone, it turns to ashes

in my hands, it is no longer a gift. The question of the gift here closely resembles the question of how God is to enter into human

experience. “If you meet the Buddha on the road, kill him.” If you have seen God, what you have seen is not God. The question of the gift as if is analyzed by Derrida arises in a

INTRODUCTION xl very specific context, one that assumes a heritage of that type of philosophy known as phenomenology while pushing that heritage to the limits. Given the extent to which the phenomenolog?-

cal and post-phenomenological debate dominated European philosophy in the twentieth century, as well as the intersection of this debate with Christian thought at various points and in differ-

ing ways, it seems appropriate to question the relationship between philosophy and theology anew with phenomenology in mind. It is all the more pertinent in the light of the work of another contemporary Frenchman, Jean-Luc Marion, whose phenomenological investigations of the possibility of revelation focus

the difficulties with precision. For our purposes, Marion's response to Derrida on the question of the gift serves to gather together all these faces of the problem of God’s self-giving. The

question of whether or not there can be a phenomenon of gift frames a discussion of the successes and failures of phenomenology as well as its theological possibilities. What follows proceeds by way of phenomenology, as it is read by each of the two main protagonists, in an examination of the gift and a consideration of some of the theological implications that emerge as a result.

This Page Intentionally Left Blank

Rethinking God As Gilt

This Page Intentionally Left Blank

Th

e Problem of the Gift THE QUESTION OF THE GIFT

A GIFT IS ANY OBJECT given by one person to another, gratuitously

(in the OLD we read that it is the “voluntary transference of prop-

erty without consideration,” where ‘consideration’ 1s taken to mean “reward” or “compensation”’). This gratuitousness is emphasized as an essential part of the gift: a gift has to be given ina certain spirit if it is to be a gift at all, and that spirit 1s sheer gener-

osity. The purest of gifts is the one that is given without motive, without reason, without any foundation other than the desire to give. A gift is, in the best sense, something that emerges from a preparedness to expect nothing in return, to be dispossessed unconditionally. The attitude of the giver of the true gift must be to expect nothing in return. And the recipient, in like spirit, must accept in complete surprise and genuine appreciation. For a gilt cannot be something earned, something automatically due, any more than it can be something passed on merely out of obligation. When [receive a gift that is not given in a spirit of generosity, [ am instantly suspicious, Once there are “strings attached,” what is given is no longer a gift, but a sign of something else. Perhaps itis a bribe, Perhaps it is like a contract, binding me in debt once accepted, Perhaps it befalls me as a blow, something intended to

embarrass me, a sign of an unequal relationship between myself and the giver. And IT may sometimes give a gift simply because it is expected or necessary. There may be a situation where a gift 1s

appropriate but where my intention is begrudging rather than gcnerous, In each of these cases, the gift becomes something burdensome, and the title “gift” is used only tentatively. There 1s no other word, but we recognize a certain lack that undermines the very gilt itself.

Of what, then, does the gift consist? It would seem that the gift

is the object that passes from one to another. Or does the true

2 RETHINKING GOD AS GIFT gift consist in the givenness? Does the gift-object serve only as a conduit for a certain excess: an excess of generous intention on the part of the one who gives, and a recognition and acceptance of that excess on the part of the one who receives? ‘This focus on the excessiveness of the intention forms part of the work of Russell Belk, who tries to define the characteristics of the “perfect gift.”' Belk interprets the expression of the perfect gift as agapic love, where the gift “is not selected and given to communicate a message ... but rather to express and celebrate our Jove for the other, [tts spontaneous, affective and celebratory rather than pre-

meditated, cognitive, and calculated to achieve certain ends.’ Such a gift, he suggests, would have the following properties: the giver makes an extraordinary sacrifice; the giver wishes solely to

please the recipient; the gift is a luxury; the gift is something uniquely appropriate to the recipient; the recipient is surprised by the gift; and the recipient desires the gift and is delighted by it.” Belk’s list does not reduce the gift solely to the intentions with which tt is given and received, but the determinative value of the

mit clearly resides in the intentional realm. Nevertheless, there can be no giftantention without a gift-object, whether that object itself be real or ideal. Yet is there such a thing as an ideal gift object? It is common to speak of gifts such as friendship, although there may be a degree of imprecision in their definition, If a giftobject were ideal, would it be possible to separate this object from its givenness? Imagining such gifts as forgiveness, friendship, love,

or inclusion, jt is interesting to note that the same measure of freedom and generosity that would characterize what has been called “the excess” also necessarily characterizes cach of these particular gifts. So at least in some cases, there may be ideal giftobjects that also embody the quality of givenness, although they are not inevitably identical with it.

Perhaps there is still something else to learn regarding the definition of the gift from the way in which it can also be known as a present. The use of the word “present” to mean a gift apparRussell W. Beik, “Phe Perfect Gut,” Gy-Giving: A Research Anthology, cd. Cele

Otnes and Richard F. Beltramini (Bowling Green, Ohio: Bewhing Green State University Popular Press, 1996), 59-84 [hereafter Belk, 7PG]. * Belk, 7PG, 61. * Belk, 7 PG, 61.

VHE PROBLEM OF THE GIFT 3 ently originatcs in the Old French locution metire une chose en prés-

ence & quelqu’un, to put a thing into the presence of someone (OED). We also speak of presenting someone with something, making a presentation, or making a present of something. So a gift seems to have something to do with presence in the present. A gift is made present, it is brought before its intended reciptent, it enters into the presence of the one who is to receive. Does this mean that there can be no giving mn secret? If | am present to a present do I have to be completely aware of it, or aware of its value as a gift? On the basis of the definition suggested earlier (that a gift is something given to someone, gratuitously), possibly not. A gift may be present, but it need not necessarily be present as a pift. This introduces a distinction between receiving and ac-

cepting. To receive is to take something into one’s possession, which does not focus the attention so much on its origins. To accept, on the other hand, means Lo “consent to receive’ (OED), to avree to take something, which implies a greater scrutiny of its importance or its impact. But can someone give without knowing that he or she gives? At first glance this would not appear to fulfill the conditions of gift-hood, because it would alter the necessary factor of gratuity. One cannot give frecly without some intention of the will. At the same time, a puzzling passage in the Christian scriptures suggests that in giving alms, the left hand should not know what the right is doing.’ And if it is possible for a gift to be

recewed without being identified as such by the recipient, why should it be impossible for a gift to be given without a similar identification? If L accept as a gift what J understand to be freely given, it effectively operates for me as a gift. In other words, to the extent that I perceive a gift to be gift, on one side or the other, it functions as a gift, and this may well be sufficient to define it as a gift. On the other hand, the risk of self-deception seems large. This leads us to the consideration of another, related word that emerges in this context, the given. If something is a given, then it is assumed, it 1s already there, or it is simply what presents itself. ‘Matt. 6:3-4: “But when you give alms, do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing, so that your alms may be done in secret; and your Father who sees in secret will reward you.’ All quotations from the Bible will be from: the New Revised Staudard Version with Apocrypha (New York: Oxford University Press, 1989).

4 RETHINKING GOD AS GIFT In this last sense, the given is that to which the philosophical disci-

pline of phenomenology is oriented. The origin of a given may well be unknown. So the given may also be a gilt. or it might not be. At times tt will be impossible to say, or the affirmation that the given is a gift will rest on criteria other than demonstrable proofs.

At the most funcamental level, then, giving takes place where a gift-object is transferred freely from one person to another. But additional specifications have emerged that inevitably amplify this definition. It is clear that for a pure gift to occur, there should be

no motive of return on the part of the donor and no anticipation

of reward on the part of the recipient. Further, according to Belk’s analysis, a gift should involve some sacrifice by the donor,

and it should have luxurious and particularly personal qualities that place it out of the realm of the ordinary for the recipient. It has also been noted that it is givenness on the one hand and/or acceptance on the other that modilv a real or an iceal object into a gift-object. Further, a gift is a present, that is, something brought

into the presence of its recipient. Finally, a gift is a given, although a given may bear some or even no relation to a gift. With regard to the phenomenon or concept we call gift, these appear to be its conditions of possibility. Summing up, it seems to me that these conditions are reducible to two. One ts that the gift is

free. That ts expressed in the demand for no motive of return, the requirement of sacrifice, and the need tor placing the gift beyond the necessities of the evervday., The other condition is that the gift is present. This relates to the recognizability of the sift as a gift and draws in the corollaries of giving and receiving (or accepting). Freedom and presence are the conditions of the gift as we know it.

THE IMPOSSIBILITY OF THE GIFT

In the preceding analysis of the gift, E described those conditions that seem to determine what can be known as a gift. But has a gift ever met these conditions? There is a kind of purity about giving

reflected in the clesire that such conditions be met, but this is almost inevitably lost in the fact. The name of gift seems to preserve the hope of its integrity, but it leaves unspoken the constant

THE PROBLEM OF THE GIFT 5 compromise of that integrity. The gift is never as we would like it to be. For is any gift given in complete freedom, where nothing

returns to the giver, even gratitude on the part of the recipient? When I acknowledge the birthday of a friend, do I really relinquish the expectation that I will be similarly acknowledged in due course? Do I ever give when there is no reason to give, or if I give spontaneously and not in relation to any occasion or act, do I not enjoy the excitement and surprise of the one to whom I giver And if I give anonymously, do I not still receive my reward m the subule self-congratulation that frequently attaches itself to acts of altruism? In short, does not the whole enterprise of giving essentially

depend on conditions to which it cannot adhere? The pure gift must not return to the one who gives, but as soon as we recognize

a gift, the gift gives back, contradicts itself, stubbornly resists being truly given. Our gifts are tainted with the stain of self-inter-

est. Why is this the case? Why is it so difficult to give without getting, to avoid what in effect becomes a series of exchanges? Why does my gift always end up having a purpose, or being a response to someone or somethings Why does your gift to me never say everything? Why are gifts always set in the context of other gifts, of lesser or greater gifts, of gifts that measure cach new gift within an inch of its hfe? Perhaps it is because our gifts always take place according to a particular horizon, and therefore within a restricted economy, whose measure cannot be escaped.°

In nuce, there are two dimensions of gift-giving that make it problematic. The giving of a gift depends on freedom: the freedom of the giver to give and the freedom of the recipient to receive. Any compulsion on either side fundamentally alters the gift-character of what ts given. The first part of the problem therefore resides in the relation between freedom and the economy. If the gift forms part of an economy, it is implicated m a process of exchange, and the gift is no longer gift but obligation, payback,

return, tradition, reason, sweetener, peace offering, or a thousand other things. The giving of a gift also depends in varying degrees on its presence, that is, on our ability to identify it as * Regarding the association between gifts, relauionships, and econonves, see the introduction by Aafke E. Komter, editor of The Gift) An Diterdisciptinary Perspective (Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press, 1996), 3-14.

6 RETHINKING GOD AS GIFT something that is a present, that is transferred between one person and another. It depends, in other words, on our knowing that it ¢s a gift, our perceiving its dimensions or borders. ‘The second

part of the problem therefore resides in the relation between presence and the cconomy. If the gift is present—that is, if it can be identified as sach—then the gift is no longer gift but commodity, value, measure, or status symbol. The basic definition of the gift (someone freely gives something to someone) never seems to accord with its practical reality. A gift is ideally something for

which we do not try to take account, and yet our gifts seem to suffer the malaise of being measured. This difficulty relates especially to two factors that are central to the whole idea of the gift, the features of freedom and presence. The significance of these

features, and the way in which they become problematic, is brought out in the analysis of giving offered by Jacques Derrida In Given Time: 1, Counterfeit Money, which 1 shall now follow in some detail,‘ In his discussion of the gift, Derrida locates one of many points

of resistance to economic thought, that is, to thought that tries to take account of everything. That there can be such points of resistance docs not mean it is possible for us through them to escape an economy altogether, for we always and already find ourselves within at least one, but instead indicates that it is impossible

to reduce everything to economic terms.’ There are some ideas, Jacques Derrida, Groen Time: 1. Counterfeit Money, wans. Peggy Kamuf (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1992) [hereafter Dermda, GTI]. Donner le temps: I. La fausse monnaie (Paris: Galilée, 1991) [hereafter Derrida, DT7].

‘This is where a distincion drawn by Georges Bataille and others becomes highly relevant. Bataille compares “restricted economies” to “general econce mies’: the former term refers to systems where the capital that is invested eventually returns to the investor; the latter refers to the situation where expenditure occurs without return, or apparently goes to waste. Bataille argues that economic growth cannot be separated from loss, that unconditional expenditure, which has no end in tself, is inevitable. No system can escape this loss; all organisms are structured in such a way that there is an excess of energy for which we cannot take account. The lea ofa totality ts in fact impossible, Reonomies bear an coxcess, or helter, econonues are witerripled by an excess, which means that there is ultimately ne bottom linc. The books are never complete. We may always

and already find ourselves within a general economy, but that does not mean we can comprehend it as though it were completely restricted. See Georges Bataille, The Accursed Share: An Essay on General Economy, wans. Robert Hurley (New York: Zone Books, 1988). See especially vol. 1, Consumption. Derrida puts

THE PROBLEM OF THE GIFT 7 for example, that exceed the capacity of economic thinking, and

hence that exceed the human capacity to achieve their reality. Such an idea would be that of the gift. Economically speaking, the gift simply does not work. It is resistant to calculation, unable to be fully thought, impossible, a black hole. In Derrida’s words, the gift is structured as an aporia." An aporia is, in the Aristotelian sense, a problem. Derrida suggests it is “the difficult or the impracticable, here the impossible,

passage, the refused, denied, or prohibited passage, indeed the nonpassage, which can in fact be something else, the event of a coming or of a future advent, which no longer has the form of the movement that consists in passing, traversing, or Wansiung.” In other words, an aporia is a problem that resists being solved because it defies any usual frame of reference. An aporia is a problem that exceeds our capacity even to hold onto it as a problem." It is resolved, not by reasoning or by proof, but only by decision."

Derrida is not the first to write on the question of the gift, but it is he who powerfully highlights the contradictory tension in its very definition, who points out its aporetic qualities, “These torward the idea that it is not possible to attain to a position of complete exteriority with regard to 1extuality, and we can apply this very widely as an example of the functioning of the economic. Jacques Derrida, Of Grammatology, trans. Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak, rev. ed, (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1998), 158. On economy generally, see G77, and also Derrida, “From Restricted to General Economy: A Hegelianism without Reserve,” Writing and Difference, trans. Alan Bass (London: Routledge, 1978}, 251-77, 270 [hereafter Derrida, WD).

*Derrida, GTI, 27-28. "Jacques Derrida, Apares, trans. Thomas Dutow (Stanford: Stanford Cniversity Press, 1993), 8 [hereafter Derrica, Aj). "Derrida, Ap, 12: “T knew what was going to be at stake in this word was the

‘not knowing where to go. It had to be a matter of the nonpassage, or rather from the experience of what happens and is fascinating in this nonpassage, paralvzing us in this separation in a way that is not necessarily negative: before a

door, a threshold, a border, a line, or simply the edge or the approach of the other as such. It should be a matter of what, in sum, appears to block our way or to separate us in the very place where of would no longer be possible to canstitute a problem, a project, or a projection.”

On the decision that resolves the aporia, sce Derrida’s essay “Sauf le nom,” trans. John P. Leavey, [r., in On the Name, ed. Thomas Dutoit (Stantord: Stanford University Press, 1995), 35-85, 54 [hereafter Derrida, SEN]. On undecidability generally, see his Dissenanation, trans. and ed. Barbara Johnson (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1981) [hereafter Derrida, D].

8 RETHINKING GOD AS GIFT conditions of possibility of the gift (that some ‘one’ gives some ‘thing’ to some ‘one other’) designate simultaneously the condilions of impossibility of the gift. And already we could translate this into other terms: these conditions of possibility define or pro-

duce the annulment, the annihilauon, the destruction of the gift.’ In Derrida’s analysis, the gift cancels itself by being elemental im an economy, a cycle of return. The gift cancels itself because as a present, it is never completely free. Derrida analyzes these conditions rigorously with reference to each element of the gift formula: donor, recipient and gift-object.

On the part of the donor, any recognition of the gift as gift anuicipates some kind of return. For according to Derrida, whenever | intentionally give, | invariably receive. I may receive another tangible gift, or I may simply receive gratitude. Even if the worst happened, and my giving were greeted with displeasure or rejection, there would still be some return, if nothing more than

the reinforcement of my own identity as a subject.'* From the pommt of view of the recipient, any awareness of the intentional meaning of a gilt places that person, too, in the cycle of exchange.

When I receive something | perceive to be a gift, I have already responded with recognition. Even if my response to the giver is one of indifference, it would be in my recognizing the gift as gift, in recognizing that I am indebted, that I would have unwittingly

entered the gift economy.'' The goodness of the gift is transformed into a burden as soon as | recognize it and therefore contract it as a debt.'" Considering the gift-object itself, we are faced with further difficulties. The gift-object may be a real thing or it may be simply a value, a symbol, or an intention.’” Again, the problem is one of recognition, which always has a reference to perceiving subjects in the present. So the problem is not whether '! Derrida, G77, 12 “Tf he recognizes it as gift, if the gift appears to him as such, if the present is present to him as present, this simple recognition suffices to annul the gift. Why?

Because it gives back, in the place, let us say, of the thing itself, a symbolic equivalent.” Derrida, GFT, 13. 4 “Tteannot be gift as gift except by not being present as gift... . There is no more gift as soon as the other recerves—ancl even of she refuses the gift that she has perceived or recogmised as gilt.” Derrida, GTT, 14. ™ Derrida, GOTT, 12.

'" Dernda, G77, 12-13.

THE PROBLEM OF ‘CHE GIFT 9 or not the gift is phenomenal, but the fact that as soon as It appears asa Gift, its gift-aspect disappears. As Derrida notes, “its very

appearance, the simple phenomenon of the gift annuls tt as gift, transforming the apparition into a phantom and the operation

Into a stmulacrum. ' The conditions of possibility of the gift are also its conditions of impossibility. Those conditions that make the giit what It is are

also the very conditions that annul it. If to give a gift means to give something freely, without retirn, then in its identification as a gift in the present, no gut is ever accomplished. Derrida insists: “if the gift appears or signifies itself, £11 exists or 1s presently as

gift, as what itis, then itis not, it annuls itself... The truth of the gift (its being or its appearing such, its as such insofar as it guides

the intentional signification of the meaning-to-say) suffices to annul the gift. The truth of the gift is equivalent to the non-gift or to the non-truth of the gift.”'* One of the critical points in this analysis is that the investiture of a gift-object with an excess of givenness on its own docs not suffice to make the gift possible as such. The question has not only to do with givenness or generosity but with whether or not the gift becomes part of a circle, or is reduced to the terms of a restricted cconomy. At the same time, it is impossible to imagine the gift in terms other than these, since it seems that they are all we have. The cifficulty that Derrida isolates is borne out by his reading of the linguistic, sociological, and anthropological material available, where it seems that the word “oift” is frequently used ina highly ambivalent way. From the linguistic side, a tension emerges within “gift” (and related words) between good and bad. A gift is most often taken

lo be a positive thing, but the word nevertheless demonstrates some instability. For example, the Lattin (and Greek) dosts, which

enters English as “dose,” bears the meanimgs of both “gift” and

“poison,” Or again, “gift” in English can translate as either “poison” or “married” in languages based on German.” Derrida also makes reference to Gloria Goodwin Raheja’s study The Poison Dervida, GLi, 14. * Derrida, GH, 26-27, " Dernda, G77, 36 n. See also Devrida, 2, 131-32 n. “" See Derrida, D131, in a note by the translator,

IQ) RETHINKING GOD AS GIFT in the Gift.”' This study explores how, in a society in northern India, a gift (den) involves the transfer of “inanspiciousness”’ from giver to recipient.“ In other words, the gilt works for the good of the donor, but the recipient obviously fares less well. What these instances collectively seem to suggest is that a gift need not be a good thing. Referring to the work of Emile Benven-

iste, Derrida observes the tension between giving and taking within the family of yift-related words.** Benveniste traces the verb

“to give” (in French donner) back to the Hittite dé, suggesting that it lies at the origin of most Indo-European versions of giving. Yet he notes the similarity of this root to the Hittite dé@, which refers not to giving but to taking. He then concludes that giving and taking actually have the same origin, or at least that it ts impossible to derive one from the other. To solve the linguistic problem that thus arises, Benveniste proposes a syntactic rather than

semantic solution. The meaning would thus depend on the way the word was used." Yet as Derrida observes: ‘“Uhis syntactic de-

cidability can function only against a background of ‘semantic ambivalence,’ which leaves the problem intact. Benveniste seems to recognise this.”’** ‘Then there is the tension in the word “gift” between something that returns and something that does not re-

turn. In his analysis of five Greek words that can be rendered “gift,” Benveniste observes that at least one includes the recognition of necessary return, the word dOativy (detine): “One would not know how to underline more clearly the functional value of the dotine, of this gift that obliges a counter-gift. This 1s the con-

stant sense it has in Heroditus; that the dotine is designed to prompt a gift in return or that il serves to compensate for an anterior gift, it always includes the idea of reciprocity.”"** Benven“1 Gloria Goodwin Raheja, The Pawson in the Gift: Ritual, Prestation, and the Domi nant Caste in a North Indian Village (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1988)

[hereafter Raheja, ’G]. 2 Raheja, PG, 31f. Derrida, GT!, 78-82. Emile Benveniste, Problémes de linguistique générale (Paris: Gallimard, 1966) {herceatter Benveniste, PLG], especially the chapter enuiled “Don et échange dans le vocabulaire indo-européen, 315-26. 4 Benveniste, PLG, 316: “Nous considérons que *do- ne signifiait proprement mt prendre’ ni “donner” mais l'un ou lautre selon la construction.” “4 Derrida, GTS, 79.

* Benveniste, PLG, 319: “Ou ne saurait souligner plus clairement la valeur fonctionnelle de la Owtivy, de ce don qui oblige 4 un contre- Or in a different context, “One of the recurrent critiques or deconstructive questions I] pose to Heidegger has to do with the privilege Heidegger grants to what he calls Versammlung, gathering. ... Once you grant some privilege to gath-

ering and not to dissociating, then you Jeave no room for the other, for the radical otherness of the other.’’*® Both the positive and the negative aspects of Derrida’s relation-

ship with Heidegger can be best illustrated for our purposes in the way Derrida reads the es gibt. An example of his reading can be taken from Spurs: Nietzsche’s Styles:

Haidegger ... submits the question of Being itself to the enigmatic operation of the abyssal gift (fe don s endettefle don sans dette). In his

development ... of the es gift Sein Heidegger demonstrates that the gunng (Geben) and the geft (Gabe), which in fact amount to nothing (to neither a subject being nor an object being), cannot be thought of in terms of Being. Because they constitute the process of propriauion, the grvng and the gi/ft{can be construed neither in the boundJacques Derrida, Paints: Interwmews, 1974-1994, ed. Elisabeth Weber, trans. Peggy Kamuf et al. (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1995), 131 [hereafter Derrida, Po].

Jacques Derrida, “The Villanova Roundtable,” in Caputo, DN, 3-48, 15 [hereafter Derrida, VA]. On the question of Heidegger and gathering, it seems to me that O'Leary's observations on the possible self-limitations of Heideggerian thought are highly relevant. See O'Leary, 7RSG. O'Leary also, of course, questions “deconstruction’s” preference for the other, asking whether or not this is just as unitary a reading of reality as Heidegger's. “Even the deconstructve version of the Arignis as essentially difference, unless is if worked out mn terms of a concrete phiralism, still risks projecting a unitary mistance which underews all religions and philosophies as the unnameable other.” O'Leary, PRSG, 246. The inportant point upon which O'Leary seizes here is the need for a working out “in terms of a conerete pluralism,”’ The difficulty, as we shail see, 1s that unless it can in some way be concretized, all talk of otherness can tend to

reduce what it amms to promote, the otherness in otherness, the plurality of othernesses. | think Derrida recognizes that alterity is only encountered tn the concrete, and that 1s where, perhaps, a Derridean “ethics” is more cffective than a Levinasian ethics.

HUSSERL. AND HEIDEGGER 4] aries of Being’s horizon nor from the vantage point of its truth, its meaning. Just as there is no such thing then as a Being or an essence of the woman or the sexual difference, there is also no such thing as an essence of the es gzbt in the es gibt Sein, that is, of Being’s

giving and gift. The “just as” finds no conjuncture. There is no such thing as a gift of Being from which there might be apprehended and opposed to it something like a determined gift... . Still, it does not follow from this that one should, by a stmple reversal, transform Being into a particular case or species of the genus propriate, give/take, life/death. Heidegger himself cautions against

making of Being a mere incident in the event called Ereignis and warns of the futile nullity of a conceptual reversal of this sort between species and genus (genre) .*’

What is Derrida saying here? He seems to recognize that for Heidegger the giving of being escapes being: Ereignis cannot be read according to the measure of being; the giving is abyssal, without ground, beyond being and beyond the “truth of being.” Heidegger would this way turn against his own metaphysical ambitions, as it were. The “‘process of propriation” that 1s Ereignis is in fact not anything. Caputo (quoting Derrida) comments: ‘Although this process is as if magnetized by a valuation or an Ineradicable preference for the proper-ty (propre), it all the more surely leads to this proper-ty’s abyssal structure” (Spurs 117). Although Heidegger ts always talking about Being and reigns, he invariably ends up in a movement beyond Being, ground, presence, and truth, landing in an abyss (Ai-grund) of dis-propriation (Lint-ergnis)

The proper is the improper; the gift a withdrawal or loss. Caputo continues: “[Heidegger] sees the /nt-eignis in Ereignis, the dissimulation in all unveiling, what Derrida calls ‘le coup de don,’ striking by means of the gift, taking away by means of giving.’’* But if we can follow Caputo’s interpretation of Derrida on He1degger further, it seems that Derrida is not entirely sure that Heidegger is willing to give up on the proper. Caputo suggests that Derrida is distracted by it, missing Heidegger’s meaning: *? Jacques Derrida, Spurs: Nietzche's Styles/Eperons: Les Styles de Nietzsche, trans.

Barbara Harlow (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1978), 120-21. ** Caputo, RA, 158.

" Caputo, RA, 158-59.

42 RETHINKING GOD AS GIFT Kreignis does not mean appropriation in the sense of the hotbed and scat of all propriety and ownness. It means producang ownness,

sending things into their own, their proper shape in the various epochs, giving things (the Being-of-beings) the tenuous identity that is never insulated from difference. . . . It itself is beyond the distinction between proper and improper, identity and difference, because it grants these and all distinctions. It gives ownness and unownedness—and hence might be translated as “‘en-own-ing,” endowing with Ownness—just the way Dasein’s “temporalizing” gives both authenticity and inauthenticity in Bemg and Time, grants them as effects. In my view, Derrida opens up this reading of Heidegger but then misses it himsclf.”

Caputo's reading would seem to be in accord with a later comment from Derrida, found in Given Time.™’ Once again, Derrida links Lregnis with a thinking of the gift. “This word Lreignis, which commonly signifies event, signals toward a thinking of appropria-

tion or of de-propriation that cannot be unrelated to that of the gift." Yet is it appropriation or de-propriation? In the forgetting, tt 1s de-propriation, a de-propriation that enables the gift to take place.’ But in the movement of appropriation, the gift can no longer be thought. “In the very position of this question, in the formulation of the project or the design of thinking, namely, the ‘in order to’ (we think ‘in erder to’... think Being and time in their ‘own element’... .), the desire to accede to the proper Is already, we could say, surreptinously ordered by Heidegger according to the dimension of ‘giving.’ ’*' It seems Derrida 1s arguing that Heidegger still desires to accede to the proper, and therefore to appropriate, with a thinking of donation thal grasps rather than letting go. Where Derrida comments on the es gibt, he links it with propriation, and in so doing he reinforces his criticism of Heidegger in that the proper bespeaks ownership, thus is an attempt to seize the origin or even to be seized by it.” ” Caputo, RE, 178. " Especially at Derrida. GF, 18-23. % Dernda, GT?, 19. “Forgetting and gift would therefore be cach in the condition of the other.” Derrida, G77, 18.

“ Derrida, GI, 21. * Maurice Blanchot’s gloss is perunent: “The donations which are the ways in which being gives by withholding itself... would be interrupted from the

HUSSERL AND HEIDEGGER 43 Yet according to Caputo’s reading, Derrida recognizes to some

extent that Heidegger’s propriation is not a possession but a being dispossessed. Derrida’s writing is subject to the same decon-

structive forces he observes elsewhere—an ambivalence that opens onto what Derrida may not mean to say. All this is intriguing in the light of Gasché’s comment on the relation between Heidegger’s and Derrida’s writing: “.. . so the thought of differance—the enabling and disabling structure of all

thinking, the thinking of Being and the thinking of differance included—cannot strictly speaking be said to be Derrida’s proper,

or to be the result of a generalizing extrapolation from Heideg-

ger’s thought on difference.” What is Derrida’s proper, and what is Heidegger’s proper, and what does each writer have to say on the proper? There is a glimpse of the proper as abyss in Heidegger, which Derrida chooses to read as Heidegger’s proper, and in so doing makes us aware of what is most not his own. Both Caputo and Gasché have further interesting comments to make on the thinking of difference and différance. If Heidegger's difference is to be understood only as the ontological difference, then there is room for Derrida to make his différance an “older” “imdit-

ference to difference.” But if Heidegger’s difference itself pre-

cedes ontological difference, then the relationship between Derrida and Heidegger becomes even closer.” It seems to me that the real difference between Heidegger and Derrida on es gibt comes down to the question of generosity, and this is brought out in Caputo’s interpretation of the “Villanova Roundtable,” written m the light of Gzven Time. Here Caputo pomts moment that the Lregnis, the advent, arrives, ceasing to Iet ttself be hidden by the ‘donations of meaning’ which 1 makes possible by its retreat. But if (since there is no other way of putting this) a decisive historical change is announced in the phrase ‘the coming comes, making us come mito our ‘mast proper, our ‘own-most’ (being), then one would have to be very naive not to think that the requirement to withdraw ceases from then on. And yet it is from then one [sze] that ‘withdraw’ rules—more obscurely, more insistently. For what of eigen, our ‘own-most’ being? We do not know, cxcept that it refers back to reqs, pust as Erergnis ‘hides’ even all the while showing it in a necessarily crude anabysis.”’ Maurice Blanchot, lhe Writing of the Disaster, rans. Ann Smock (Lincoln: Cniersity of Nebraska Press, 1995), 102 [hereafter Blanchet, WOD]. " Gasché, /DJD, 79. He refers also to Caputo, ™ See Gasché, IDJD, chapter 3. * See Caputo, RH, 179ff.

44 RETHINKING GOD AS GIFT out that Heidegger fails on Derrida’s terms with regard to the gift, no longer with direct reference to appropriation but to the appropriation that is implied once the gift is laden with generous intent: That gift without gifl, without the swelling and contracting of gifting, could take place only if everything happened below the level of conscious intentionality, where no one intends to give anything to anyone and no one Is intentionally conscious of receiving any-

thing. Such austere, Grinch-like conditions are hardly met at all anywhere. Not even Heidegger's notion of the es gibt das Sean can meet this requirement, for Heidegger at once seizes upon the generosity embedded in the German idiom es gibt (geben, die Gabe), which is supposed to mean simply “there is.”” ...On this account, the French idiom 2» @ is better and more “value-free,” more neutral and indeterminate.

What seems best to meet the demands of this ungenerous and ungrateful gifting is Plato's kA#dra, the absolutely indeterminate and

indeterminable receptacle which cannot be determined as mother,

nurse or receptacle, which 1s too un-kind, un-kin, and un-gendered, a-genos, to en-gender anything, which emblematizes or em-

bodies (without a body) the pure “taking place” or “spacing” of differance itself.™

We are led, then, from es g2bt back to kkéra (and perhaps we should have half an eye at the same time to Blanchot’s “neuter,” or Levinas’s if y a).'°° Khéra, however, opens onto many more themes than I can address at this point, With regard to the question of Derrida and khéra, I wish only to note at this stage that i does bear on the question of God and gift.’"" With this in mind, we turn to consider Levinas. ® Caputo, DN, 143; see also 94-95,

With regard to the neuter, sce Blanchot, WOD, 48-49, or 57, for example, or his The Space of Literahere, trans, Anu Smock (Lincohiy: University of Nebraska Press, 1982}, 168-70 [hereafter Blanchot, S7.]. 1 will discuss the Levinasian ily 4

in the next chapter. ™ Hence, in “Saufle nom": " ‘God’ is the name of this bottomless collapse, of this endless desertification of language. But the trace of this negative operation is inscribed zt and or and as the event... . Phere is this event, which remains, even if this remmance is not more substantial, more essential than this God, more ontologrcally determinable than this name of God of whom it is said that he names nothing that ts, neither this nor that. It ig even said of him that he is not what ts given there in the sense of es grb’: He is not what gives, his is beyond all gifts.” Another voice responds to this passage, “/n and on, you said, that

implies, apparently, some lopes. .. ,” and the reply begins “— ... or some khéra...”’ Derrida, SLN, 55-56.

Levi LEVINAS: A DIALOGUE WITH HUSSERL

THE WORK OF EMMANUEL LEVINAS is important in this context for

three reasons: first, because it is a dialogue with and a departure

from the thinking of both Husserl and Heidegger; second, because it marks a further application and development of the phe-

nomenological method; and third, because in each of the aforementioned respects it has had enormous influcnee on JeanLuc Marion.! In my examination of Levinas | will order ny comments according to these aspects of his relevance. In 1930, Levinas produced The Theory of Intittion in Husserts Phenomenology, in which he gives a largely favorable account of

Husserl’s development of the phenomenological method, although it is tempered with certain criticisms.* If Husserl’s project has been to uncover that which has been given to consciousness, it is precisely on this area of givenness that Levinas concentrates his study, in a very particular way. For Levinas, it 1s the breadth of what is given that is important. In Husserl’s work, Levinas finds a philosophical method that is potentially open to the given expertence of life itself. At the same time, however, he discerns tn the

application of this method particular presuppositions that limit its efficacy, and it 1s on his concerns about these presuppositions ‘With regard to Levinas and hus relationship to phenomenology, sec Kearney, DCCL, 30, where Levinas states: “Phenomenology represented the second, but undoubtedly most pnportant, philosophical mfluence on my thmking. Indeed,

irom the pot of view of philosophical method and discipline, remain to this day a phenomenologist.” Nevertheless, Levmas constantly goes beyond the houndaries of phenomenology, paruiculariy as he seeks to place the encounter with “the Other” beyond what can be thematized, hence what can be “seen.” “Many commentators suggest that Levinas’s reading of Husserl at this time ts from a Heideggerian perspective, and that his criticisms are often Heideggerian in nature, See, for example, Adriaan Peperzak. Beyond: The Philosophy of Emmanvel Levinas (Evanston: Northwestern University Press, 1997), 40 [hereafter Peperzak, B}.

46 RETHINKING GOD AS GIFT that I will focus. These concerns have to do with the nature of intentionality, the question of representation, the process of mtuition, the primacy of consciousness and perception, and the reduction of the other person (the Other) to the experience of “the Same.’”#

For Husserl, as for Franz Brentano before him, “intentionality”

reters to the relationship between consciousness and its object; stated simply, consciousness is always consciousness of something.’ But the crucial question is whether or not being conscious of something means that this something thus becomes an object of thematization. In other words, is all consciousness theoretical? This is the question that dominates Levinas’s reading of Husserl.? Levinas points out two ambiguities in Husserl’s understanding

of intentionality. ‘There is initially an ambiguity that relates to Husserl’s understanding of experience. Experience for Husserl is not primarily Mrfahrung (experience in the sense that Derrida describes as a “movement of traversing”), but Frlebnis, which Hus-

serl characterizes as “‘whatever is to be found in the stream of experience, or according to (the translation of) Levinas’s trans* Twill follow the approach adopted by some of Levinas’s translators in render-

Ing auiruras “the Other,” meaning “the other person,” and autre as “other.” See Sean Hand’s preface to The Levinas Reader. ‘Levinas, 77HP, 37. Brentano himself takes up the idea from medieval theology. Peperzak describes the twofold nature of intentionality as “the presence of

the object to consciousness or as the presence of conscrausness to its objects.” Peperzak, 4, 41. >What micrests Levinas is that Husserl’s understanding of intentionality seems Lo cmbrace the whole of life as it is lived, and not to artificially divide conscrousness fram its objeets. “The most fundamental contribution of Husserl’s phenomenology 1s its methodical disclosure of how meaning comes to be, how if emerges in our consciousness of the world, or more precisely, in our becoming conscious of our mtentional rapport (vsée) with the world. The phenomenological method enables us to discover meaning with our lived experience; IL reveals consciousness to be an intentionality always in contact with objects

outside of itself, other than itself. Human experience is not some self-transparent substance or pure cogita; iCis always intending or tending towards something in the world which prevecupies it.” Emmanuel Levinas, in Kearney, DECT) 50. Husserl propose Vintuition eid¢tique, Tintentionnalité, Je primat de la conscience, ‘le primat des essences incxactes, Morphologiques, sur les essences exactes, Mathématiques, wn cogte inséparable de son cogtiatum, un ego subjugueé par Laitérite dans Pintentionnalité qui est essence de la conscience et Je fondement de la vérité.”” Marie-Anne Lescourret, Emmanuel Lewras (Paris: Flanwnarion, 1994). 84,

LEVINAS 47 lation, “everything which takes place in the flow of consc1ousness. ”® Within experience as frleinis, Husserl includes sense data, or Ayle, which need not themselves necessarily form intentional objects. This would mean that Ay/e could be described in Husserl’s terms as “non-mtentional” experience, according to a defimition

of intentionality as ‘consciousness of something.” Sense data would therefore be that part of lived experience of which we were not (usually) consciously aware, Levinas observes, however, that Husserl eventually attributes even to Ayletic elements the status of intentional objects, in the sense that they assume a transcendent

meaning.’ In this way, Husserl arrives at a conception ol intentionality that is allembracing. Experience (£rlebnis) becomes equivalent to intentionality as the sclftranscending dynamic of consciousness. So the first aspect of ambiguity relates to the way that intentionality and experience are related. Are they one and the same? More precisely, does the fact that Husserl makes /hyletec

elements intentional objects expand intentionality to include what is not theoretically apprehended, or diminish experience to that which is thematized within itr There is next an ambiguity that concerns Husserl’s subsequent expansion of the idea of intentionality. Levinas explains that for Husserl, intentionality is “what makes up the very subjectruity of sub-

jects.”"* He then indicates that the types of objects toward which intentionality is directed can be different. “All the forms of our

life, affective, practical, and aesthetic, are characterized by a relation to an object... . /nlentionality rs different in each of these cases, 1. cach act the voluntary and affective elements are special ways of being directed toward an outside object, special ways of

transcending onesclf." This is an important insight, because it *Derrida, Po, 373; Husserl, ff, 120; Levinas, (TAP, 38.

“We can distnguish in consciousness an anumating act which gives to the hylete phenomena a transcendent meaning: they signify something from the external world, they represent it, desire it, love it, etc. This act is an element which has a mode of existing identical to that of hyletic data, Le., it is conscious and constituted in immanent time; it knows itself in the implicit manner which is characteristic of Erlebnisse. Yet it gives a meaning to the flow of consciousness.

Jt imiends something other than itself it transcends iself.” Levinas, TTHP, 39. Later Levinas suggests that “the lryletec dlata.. . are already constituted by a deeper intentionality proper lo consciousness.” DIHP, 47, * Levinas, T7HP 41. "Levinas. 7 LFEP, 43.

48 RETHINKING GOD AS GIFT attributes meaning not only to things that can be grasped theoretically but also to values and desires. “We now see that concrete life must be taken 1m all its forms and not merely in the theoretical form. Correlatively, the real world is not simply a world of things

correlative to perceptive acts (purely theoretical acts); the real world is a world of objects of practical use and values.”’"” If Husserl

now allows for differen. types of intentionality, he 1s allowing for

a broader understanding of consciousness that does not equate with thematization.!! The examination of the nature of intentionality is related to the

question of representation. Husserl’s reading of representation ( Vorstellen, an “experienced act of presentation’) is such that in It consciousness objectifies its contents to itself!" Representations are defined by Husserl as ‘“‘objectifying acts.”!° Yet this underLevinas, ZIHP, 44. Peperzak observes: “Husserl’s renewal of philosophy through phenomenology can be sununarized in the word ‘intentionality.’ He saw not only that all consciousness is a cogito of something (cog?tatum), but also

that the intentional structure of consciousness cannot be characterized as the relation between a representing subject and objects met by that subject. Feeling, walking, desiring, ruminating, eating, drinking, hammering, too, are intentions—or rather clusters of intentions, related in a specific, nonrepresentational way to specific correlates.” Adriaan Peperzak, Jo the Other: An Introduction to the Philosophy of Emmanuel Levinas (West Lafayette, Ind.: Purdue University Press, 1993), 14 [hereafter Peperzak, TTO].

' Levinas develops this understanding of intentionality m “Intentonalité et métaphysigque,” En découvrant Uexistence aver Husserl et Herdegger, 5th ed. (Paris:

Vrin, 1967), 137-44. [hereafter Levinas, KDEHH]. This essay can be found in transtatian in Emmanuel bevinas, Discovernng Rxistence with Husserl, trans. Richard A. Cohen and Michael B. Smith (Evanston: Northwestern University Press, 1998), 127-29. Levmas, THLP 57. This is in contrast to Brentano's view that representation

mcans a neutral image of the intentional object appears in the consciousness. There are three German words that cau be translated by “representation”: Darstellung (presentation, sensible prescutation, or “poetic presence’); Verstellung (representauion, which involves the mternal representation of an image); and Représentavion (material presentation, “the act of inaking present in a material and visual bul not necessarily poctic sense”). See Avade Sevhan, Representation and lis Discontents (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1992), 7. Levinas, PfWP, 57. “The main model lor every kind of mtentionality is the perception, or even the vision, of an object which 1s there, facing consciousness asa Gegenstand (TTA, 135). The structure of the reflecteon through which consciousness knows itselfis concewed of in analogy with the perception of external objects. In transcendental phenomenology, consciousness 1s studied as a sort of Gegenstand, while reflection, to which consciousness 18 given, 1s a sort of looking at something before it, a sort of Vorstellung (TUH, 184-85). The

LEVINAS 49 standing of representation raises certain difficulties. If that of which I am conscious can only be that of which I can make an objective representation, then those experiences that defy such objectivity will also defy consciousness (and hence even experience itself), This seems an impracticable state of affairs, for surely consciousness is broader than specific, objective representations within it. Levinas overcomes this difficulty by making a distinction between “representation” and “having a sense.” He gives the example of love: “The act of love has a sense, but this does not mean that it includes a representation of the object loved together with a purely subjective feeling which has no sense and which accompa-

nies the representation. The characteristic of the loved object is precisely to be given in a love intention, an intention which 1s irreducible to a purely theoretical representation." While Husserl does not strictly confine the structure of intenUionalily Lo tts representation of objects, Levinas observes within Husserl’s work a tendency to emphasize this aspect of intentionality, thus relimiting what he has just expanded.’” The second mo-

ment of ambiguity has been uncovered: there are for ITusserl different types of intentionality, not all theoretical, but ultimately all coming back to the theoretical. In Totality and Infinity, Levinas makes his criticism plain: “The thesis that every intentionality is

either a representation or founded on a representation dominates the Logische Untersuchungen and returns as an obsession in all of Husserl’s subsequent work.’’!® In the same passage, Levinas ‘objective’ (gegenstdndliche) mode of being is central for Husserl’s phenomenology, and knowledge 1s understood on the basis of objectification, it is primarily Vorstelhing or representavon.” Peperzak, B, 41. See also John Llewelyn, Emmanuel Levinas: The Genealogy of Ethics (London: Routledge, 1995) [hereafter Llewelyn, ELGE]), 774f,.

Levinas, LHP, 44-45. 'S Levinas, T7FP, 53. “Although Husserl recognised the fact that, in addition

io abjectifug, presenting and representing intentions, consciousness is also constituted by affecuve and pracucal intentions, he maintaived—at least in his earlier works—the primordial and exemplary role of the theoretical or doxic indentions, Notwithstanding his cffort to purify consciousness from all conungent and particular features in order to reach a truly transcendental perspective, consciousness remained a panoramic view Of a universe of presently given, remembered, or anticipated phenomena.” Peperzak, 77O, 15. ‘Emmanuel Levinas, Totality and Infinity: An Essay on Exteriority, wans. Alphonso Lingis (The Hague: Martinus Nijhoff, 1979), 122 [hereafter Levinas, TY].

Hg RETHINKING GOD AS GIFT goes on to ask: “What is the relation between the theoretical intentionality of the objectifying act, as Husser] calls it, and enjoyment?”’'? For Levinas, enjoyment is more fundamental than my ability to represent it. “Enjoyment is not a psychological state among others, the affective tonality of empiricist psychology, but the very pulsation of the [."""* While Husserl explicitly states that

the real world is what is experienced, and that this must include the aesthetic and the practical, his notion of representation as an objectitying act” seems to favor the intellectualization of experience."” Intuition (the relationship between consciousness and ideas) becomes a purely theoretical act: everything is objectified.” Levinas alerts us to the problematic nature of this position, where even objects of the will “must have to some extent the mode of existence of theoretical objects.’”*! After discussing intentionality in general, Levinas turns to focus

more specifically on the process of intuition itself, that aspect of

Infenuionality “through which we enter into contact with being, “** Husserl contrasts a “signifying act” (where “objects are

meant without being given’) with an “intuitive act” (“which reaches tts object’').?* Levinas explains the difference as not con-

cerning the degree of clarity, but having to do with whether or not the object is attained. “To say that intuition actualizes the mere intention which aims at the object is to say that in intuition we relate directly to the object, we reach it. That is the entire difference between aiming at something and reaching it. A signifying intention does not possess its object in any way; it only thinks

i" A signifying act—often, but not necessarily, a word—has a meaning, but its objective referent is not directly presented, and so its Intention is “empty.”’ Since a signifying act belongs only to

the sphere of thought, it is possible that it might refer to something that is not real. On the other hand, an intuitive act encounters reality in seemng it. Nevertheless, signifying acts are not to be Levinas, TY, 122. “Levinas, 77 113. ’ Peperzak, 8, 41-43. *’ Levinas, T7TAP, 63.

“ Levinas, TTP. 63. “ Leyimas, PAP. 65. “3 Leymias, PfTHP. 65-66.

“? Levinas, TIP. 67.

LEVINAS 5] discounted altogether.’ Signifying acts on their own cannot be taken as knowledge, but when they encounter reality they become part of knowledge. This occurs where what is meant in the signifying intention is confirmed (or displaced) by an act of intuuon.™ Husserl’s understanding of intuition is completed in his idea of

“fullness.” When an object that is meant is also given, it has a fullness about it? The word is used both to indicate the direct presence of the object to the consciousness and to indicate the contents of the intention that are present as a result of the presence of the object.x> When the direct presence 1s by way of percep-

tion (i.e., a presentation), the fullness of the intention 1s exhibited in scnsations.*” When it is by way of memory or imagina-

tion (i.c., a re-presentation), the fullness of the intentional act 1s exhibited in phantasms. This leads Levinas to note the important

role perception plays in Husserl’s work: “Perception gives us being. It is through reflecting on the act of percepuion that we must seek the origin of the very notion of being.” [t 1s also through reflecting on percepuion that we are able to speak of truth. When a signifying act corresponds with an act of intuition, it is fulfilled evidentially. “Evidence” vefers to the presence of consciousness to being, and so being and truth origmate in the same source.”!

Levinas is keen to pursue any menuon of intuttion that occurs in valuing and willing, This possibiltty 1s raised in /deas [, where

Husserl suggests that there can be “practical and axiological truths” in addition to theoretical truths.*? Nevertheless, Husserl’s “> Levinas, TYP. 68-69, *6 Levinas, 7THP, 74, 69.

“7 Levinas, TTHP, 69. Uhe central thought that self-givenness 1s the main form of being and that ideal knowledge is adequacy (1.c. the exact ‘fitting’ of the world mto consciousness) Is expressed in Husserl’s theory of truth as the ‘realizagon’ or the fulfillment (Avftidlung) through intuinon of the ‘signifyimg’ act which otherwise would reniain empey, but alse in the funcamental role of evidence Lor all

knowledge anc in Husserl’s theory of juckgement as the clirect intuition of a more complex object.’ Peperzak, 8, 41. Levinas, PLAP, 69. "" Levinas, THP, 70: “sensations are elements which, m life, represent abyects, although only with the help of intenuoenalitv.”

Levinas, SEP 7b. The reemergence of the ontological question in this way obviously points to disagreement with Heidegger. “Levinas, TAP, 75. * Levinas, PHP VAS.

52 RETHINKING GOD AS GIFT analysis returns quickly to the priority of the theoretical, with his notion of “doxic theses.”*? According to this notion, even intuitions that are primarily nontheoretical must return to a theoreti-

cal point (the doxic thesis) before it can be asserted that the objects exist for consciousness.* Levinas locates here a possibility for phenomenclogy that seems to have been overlooked, that the given need not only be that which can be understood. What inter-

ests him is the possibility that there might be signification that gives meaning but which cannot be thematized as knowledge, and

his detailed examination of the various elements of Husserl’s work enables him to lay the groundwork for his own philosophical position. According to this position, vision (perception, theory, understanding, light) is unable to account for the richness and diversity of life as it is lived. So Levinas lists three further objections to Husserl that are based around this central question: is it possible for phenomenology to reach, in reflection, life as it is, or Only life as it is reflected in consciousness? Reflection naturally gives to life, Levinas suggests, a quality of “being reflected”;

it seems cut off from the reality of life as it is being lived. The phenomenological reduction requires a step back that seems to 4 Levinas, TAP, 134: “This doxic thesis is the clement of intenuonality which ... thinks of objects as existing.”’ “ Levinas, TZHP, 134. Nevertheless, Peperzak notes a shift im Husserl’s position: “Although in his /deen Husserl stated even more clearly that the central place in knowledge is taken not by objectification and representation, but by ‘lived expenence’ (£rlebnis), Levinas holds that Husserl continued to consider the objectifying acts to be fundamental. The doxic thesis is always included as the basic intention positing the existence of the meant object. Later on, however, Levinas puts the accent on Husser]’s radical distinction between meaning (Sinn, Semsinn) and object, a distinction effectively exploited by Heidegger, who thereby freed phenomenology from its representationist remnants."’ Peperzak, 8, 42. The “later on” to which Peperzak refers is the 1940 essay “L’oeuvre d’Edmond Husserl,’ which appears in the collection EDEHH, 7-52. Of particular relevance are Levinas's comments at 23-24, * Llewelyn comments; “In his placing of the ethical in the economy of being and in his placing of the economy of being in the non-economy of the ethical, Levinas will call into question the primacy of theory, that 1s to say of thedna, secing.’” Llewelyn, ELG#, 57. Yet Llewelyn goes on to note the putential difficulty in Levinas's position when he constantly speaks of awakening, of the “opening of eyes.” Llewelyn translates the Levinasian metaphor as a kind of “sptritual opucs, or an “optics without synoptics” (58), which is complicated by Levinas’s aural imagery. This leads to a problem when Levinas seeks to express the encounter with the Other.

LEVINAS 53 cut across the experience it is designed to highlight, and seems removed from the empirical, the everyday, the historical.*° Levinas then points out that the temporal structure of consciousness makes it impossible to grasp acts reflectively “in the present” (1.e., in all their fullness). Presentation is necessarily re-presentation.”’ Finally, he indicates that phenomena themselves occur differently

in their immediately experienced state than in their state in reflection.”*

Another aspect of Husserl’s work that Levinas considers problematic is Husserl’s emphasis on consciousness. Not only does Husserl not entirely clarify the nature of the reduced consciousness (in distinction from psychological consciousness), but he does not deal adequately with intersubjectivity.*° While Husser] addresses the second question in the later text Cartesian Meditations, Levinas will also find his treatment there problematic, since

it seems Husserl reduces the other person to the experience of the ego.” In Totality and Infinity, Levinas describes the problem: The constitution of the Other’s body in what Husserl calls “the primordial sphere,” the transcendental “coupling” of the object thus constituted with my own body itself experienced from within as an “I can,” the comprehension of this body of the Other as an alter ega—this analysis dissimulates, in each of its stages which are taken as a description of constitution, mutations of object constitution into a relation with the Other—which is as primordial as the constitution from which it is to be derived.” 36 Levmas, TITHP, 142: “The natural attitude is not purely contemplative; the world is not purely an object of scientific investigation. Yet 1t seems that man suddenly accomplishes the phenomenological reduction by a purely theoretical act of reflection upon life.” See also Levinas, 7/HP, 119; Peperzak, B, 43. 37 “Levinas isolates a further set of problems in Husserlian phenomenology

arising from the privilege it accords to presence, the present and

representation. . .. Like Derrida in La Voix et le phénomene, Levinas submits the

texts of phenomenology to thorough close examination and finds in them a fundamental contradiction: whilst predicated on the privilege of presence, they also imply that presence 1s originally fissured, that it is never fully possessed. The key notion of representation thus also becomes problematic: an object which ts not present to itself cannot easily be re-presented to a transcendental Ego whose own self-presence is insecure.’ Colin Davis, Levinas: An Introduction (Cambnidge: Polity Press, 1996), 19-20 [hereafter Davis, LA/]. See also Llewelyn, ELGE, 48ff. 38 Levinas, 7TTHP, 137.

39 Levinas, TIHP, 150-51.

Husserl, CM; sce especially Meditation Five. 1 Levinas, 71, 67.

a4 RETHINKING GOD AS GIFT What emerges as the chief focus of Levinas’s work is the thinking

of this relation to the Other, this “relationless relation,’ which Levinas places prior to conscious thematization, In working out this relation, Levinas encounters some difficulty with the word “experience” (dexpérience): from lus broad and inclusive sense of expericnce, which contrasts with Husserl’s narrower, theoretical sense, Levinas moves to a more limited sense when it comes to

referring to the encounter with the Other.” To sum up Levinas’s consideration of Husserl, it could be said "The epiphany of the Other subordinates the world of phenomena and experiences to responsibility. Insofar as we lrave learned the meaning of the words ‘phenomenon,’ ‘experience, ‘manifestation, ‘truth,’ etc., within the context Of Western cgology, they are all marked by the ‘egonomic’ mode of bemp described above. As an intruder into this world, the Other, or the Infinite, can neither be described as an object of our knowledge, nor as a phenom-

enon in the proper sense of the word. The supreme demand is not ‘expericnced as a ‘presence’ and, in its complete difference from any observ able figure, the face 1s invisible.” Peperzak, 8, 14. “Both Kant and Levinas re-

fuse to call the revelation of the Other's respectability an ‘experience’ (hrfahrung, expérence), because it cannot be understood as a perception ruled by the conditions of empirical schemausin or phenomenological fulfillment, but for both thinkers that revelation 1s an exceptional sort of awareness, from which all philosophy should start.” Peperzak, B, 199. Note that Peperzak sugresis hrfadrung rather than Erfebazs. Yet Levinas also describes the encounter with the Other as “expenence par excellence.” Levinas, TI, 109. See Llewelyn, EGE, 85. Hart suggests that “‘Levmias proposes a way beyond romanticism by aligning experience and presence [and] then distinguishing experience and epiphany.” Kevin Hart, “The Experience of Poetry,” Boxkete: A fourned of Poetry and Poetics 2 (1998): 285-304, 291 (hereafter Hart, AP|. In other words, Levinas

moves beyond speaking of the relauion to the Other as experience, or at least heavily qualifies it. “The relation with miinity cannot, to be sure, be stated im terms of experience, for mfinity overflows the thought that thinks it. Its very miftreton 1s produced precisely im this overflowing. The relation with infinity will have to be stated in terms other than those of objecuve expertence; but if experience precisely means a relation with the absolutely other, that 1s, with what always overflows thought, the relation with infinity accomplishes experience in the fullest sense of the word." Levinas, JV, 25. Yet see alsa the 1965 essay “Enigma and Phenomenon,” in Basie Philosaphucal Writings, ed, Adriaan T. Peperzak, Simon Critchley, and Robert Bernasconi (Bloonungton: Indiana University Press, 1996), 65-77 [hereafter Levinas, -P], wherc, for example, when Levinas speaks of God, he says: “The umnpossibility of manifesting itself in an experience can he due not to the finite or sensible essence of this exper ence but to the structure of all thought, which is correlauion” (67). In “Truth of Disclosure and Truth of Tesamony” (1972), published in the same collection (98-107), Levinas observes: “My responsibility for the other 1s precisely this relauon with an uncthematizable Infinity. It is neither the experience of Infinity nor proof of it: it fesafies to Infinity” (103).

LEVINAS DD that Levinas’s work rests on the very possibilities that Husserl to

a large extent leaves unthought, while putting in question the foundations upon which Husserl’s project is buili—the certainty, the self-presence of the cogito. Levinas may continue to call himself a phenomcenologist, but he abandons the phenomenological bias toward seeing in favor of a more radical “hearing” of a call to responsibility that comes from the Other.” Resisting the reduction of experience cxclusively to the theoretical, Levinas maintains that theoretical consciousness does not and cannot envelop the given.

LEVINAS AND HEIDEGGER

Levinas initially embraces Heideggerian thought, particularly as a response to the lack he perceives in Husserlian phenomenology of a relation to life as it is lived, to existence. But Levinas’s attitude toward Heidegger changes as he observes the way phenome-

nology as ontology not only provides a positive possibility for approaching questions about embodied existence but also becomes with Heidegger a negative, all-encompassing strategy for grasping life in understanding.” This view of Heideggerian ontology is, perhaps, not uninfluenced by Heidegger's political forays

in the 1930s, and by the sense evident in many of Heidegger's "On hearing and prophecy, see Mare Richir, “Phénomene et Infini, |’ Lyrvidn-

vel Levinas, ed. Catherme Chaher and Miguel Abeusour, Cahier de I. Tlerne (Paris: L'Herne, 1991), 241-61, 254-55. YW Levinas, KDE, 72: “la philosophie dans son fond nest pas une connaissance contemplative au sujet de laquelle il y aurait lieu de se poser des questions

de méthode préalablement, mais que, conformément a lontologisme de Heidegger, celle est, dans son essence la plus intime, la possibilité dune existence concréte” (“[that] philosophy in its depth 1s not a contemplative knowledge on the subject of which we should firstly ask quesuions of method, but that, according to the ontologism of Tleidegger, it is, in its most Intunate essence, the poss bility of a concrete existence”). Levinas positively evaluates the work of the carly Heidegger in his reflections in Kearney, DCCT, 51-52: “I would say, by way of summary. that if t was Husserl whe opened up for me the radical possibilitres of a phenomenological analysis of knowledge, 1¢ was Heidegger who first gave these possibilities a positive ancl concrete grounding im our everyday existence: Heidegger showed Lhat the phenomenological search tor eternal truths and essences wtimately onginates m die, in our temporal and historical existence.” ™ See the discussion by Peperzak, 8, 49 ff.

26 RETHINKING GOD AS GIFT writings that the question of being is intimately linked with the destiny of the German nation.”* Yet it is expressed most powerfully not in any personal attack on Heidegger and National Socialism, but in a philosophical (or quasi-philosophical) attack on the totality and neutrality of being.”

If Levinas rejects what he sees in Husserl as a tendency to reduce experience to knowledge or objectivity, he no less rejects what he sees in Heidegger as a tendency to absorb all meaning in ontology, an ontology that ultimately always comes back to the subject.” Expressed in the terms introduced in the first chapter of this book, the totality of being to which Levinas refers might also be known as the economy of being, where all is understood

according to the horizon of “is-ness.’ In other words, where being becomes the horizon against which all else is to be judged, and judged in terms of critical thought, then that which cannot be seen in those terms is overlooked, reduced, or ignored.” For With regard to Heidegger's political leanmgs, see Hugo Ott, Martin Heidegger A Pobical Life, trans. Allan Bhinden (London: Fontana, 1994). With regard to the philosophical implications ol Heicdegger’s political thought, see Caputo, DH.

"With regard to Levinas on Heidegger and National Socialism, most commentators seem (to advert to the criticism but are only able to substantiate it indirectly. See Peperzak, B, 204—5. Levinas did recently republish a brief article, “1933-1934: Thoughts on National Socialism: Reflections on the Philosophy of Hitlerism,” trans. Sean Hand, Cniecal Inguery 17 (1990-91): 62-71, although this docs not help us a great deal. * Levinas writes: “The well-known theses of Heideggerian philosophy—the preeminence of Being over beings, of ontology over metaphysics—end up affirming a tradition in which the same dominates the Other.” Emmanuel Levi-

nas, “Philosophy and the Idea of the Infinite,” in Peperzak, 770, 105. Peperzak’s commentary on this text, particularly on Levinas’s relation with Hei-

degger, is excellent at pp. 100-101. “The visage of being that shows itself in war is fixed in the concept of totality, which dominates Western philosophy. Indivicluals are reduced to being bearers of forces that command them unbeknown to themselves. The meaning of indivichials (invisible outside of this total-

ity} is derived from the totality. The unicity of each present is meessantly sacrificed to a future appealed to io bring forth its objective meaning. For the ultimate meaning alone counts; the bast act alone changes beings into themselves.'” Levimas, 7/7, 21-22.

“On Levinas and economy, see Llewelyn, #LGH, 67-69. Levinas writes extensively on the “home” in Totality and Infinity.

*° Llewelyn notes the importance of understanding what Levinas means by ontology: “In Totality and Infinity he asserts repeatedly that he is disunguishing

LEVINAS 57 Levinas, “exemplifying” (if it could) that which cannot be seen in terms of being and comprehension is the Other.*! Totalization and the possibility of its exception raises for Levinas the question of ethics, and he asserts that it is the ethical, arising in my responsibility for the Other, that precedes ontology. That Heidegger does not speak of ethics is, for Levinas, a crucial flaw in his thinking. ““We therefore are also radically opposed to Heidegger who

subordinates the relation with the Other to ontology (which, moreover, he determines as though the relation with the interlocutor and the Master could be reduced to it) rather than seeing in justice and injustice a primordial access to the Other beyond all ontology.’>2 What Heidegger sees as a positive plenitude (es gzbt Sein), Levinas comes to see as a suffocating totalitarianism.” This perspective emerges in Levinas’s early texts, such as De /évasion, ontological structures or ways of being. Unless one grasps that when Levinas asserts this he is continuing a tradition to which Heidegger belongs, one will be perplexed as to how that book can be so critical of ontology. There is no reason why Levinas should net make ontological criticisms of fundamental ontology. But the ontology he defends in that book is not fundamental ontology in what he takes to be the sense ontology has in Being and ime. Levinas’s ontology calls into question the fundamentality of the ‘ontological difference,’ the distinction between being and beings, between the ontological and the ontic, upon which Bang and Time takes its stand. As previously noted, Levinas's ontology stands for the ontological significance of concrete empirical, hence ontic, experience. Whether or not Heidegger does too is not a question we shall reopen here.” Llewelyn, ELGE, 108. See also chapter | of EL.GE, which Llewelyn entilles “Ontological Claustrophobia.”

In Heidegger coexistence is, to be sure, taken as a relationship with the Other irreducible to objective cognition; but in the final analysis it also rests on the relationship with bemg in general, on comprehension, on ontology. Heidegger posits in advance this ground of being as the horizon on which every existent arises, aS though the honmzon, and the idea of limit it includes and which is proper to vision, were the ultimate structure of relauonship. Moreover, for Heidegger intersubjectivity is a co-existence, a we prior to the I and the other, a neutral intersubjectivity.”” Levinas, 77, 67-68. 52 Levinas, JY, 89.

*3 “If we seek, in abstraction from Others and from the self that I always am, to describe the ‘#4 @ that precedes all phenomena, what we find 1s not at alla generous and illuminating origin, but rather the anonymity of a dark, chaotic, and direcuionless rumbling without any structure or shape. Light and order pro-

ceed not from this ‘Being,’ but from something else: from the Other, the stranger who comes from afar, from an unreachable unknown, whose visage iuminates the world. The human Other’s look is the origin of all meaning.” Peperzak, B, 212.

58 RETHINKING GOD AS CIEL De Texistence a Vexistant, and Le temps et Vautre, particularly where

(in the latter two) he explores the malevolence of Being in his phenomenological sketches of the iy a." One such sketch emerges in the coutext of a description of the experience of Insomnia. Insomnia is a confrontation with the é y a, an experience of watchfulness for no purpose, In insomnia, | am “held by being”: I find it onerous to be.” T do not intend any particular object, but there is a presence that I sense. ““This presence which arises behind nothingness is neither « beng, or consciousness functioning in a void, but the universal fact of the there 7s, which encompasses things and consciousness.” Levinas draws a distinction between attention and vigilance. In the former, the subject has internal or external objects in focus. In the latter, the subject loses its subjectivity: there are no objects, there

is no freedom, there is no inside or outside, there is simply unyielding presence.’ He notes the anonymity which this presence engenders. “It is not that there is my vigilance in the night; in insomnia it is the night itself uhat watches." The I becomes object, rather than subject—it ts depersonalized. This contrasts with consciousness, which “is precisely the breakup of the insomnia of anonymous being, the possibility to ‘suspend,’ . . . to take refuge “' Fmmanwel Levinas, De {evasion (Montpellier: Fata Morgana, 1982); Levinas, hi, Levinas, Le fenips et Cantre, oth ecl. (Paris: Presses Universitaires de France, 19394) (hereafter Levinas, TA]. See the discussion by Davis, LAL, 22-24. Levinas, Ek, 65,

Levinas, Hh, 65. “That does not come down to say that it is an experience of nothingness, but that itis as anonymous as the mght itself.” Levinas, EE, 65. * Levinas, KE, 66, This is reminiscent of the “experience” described by Maurice Blanchot in the novel Thomas CObscur, new cd. (Paris: Gallimard, 1950), for

example at 50-51: “Déja, alors quill se penchant encore sur ce vide ot il voyait son unage dans absence totale d images, saisi par le plus violent verge qui {Tit verge qui ne faisait pas tomber, mais Pempeéchait de tomber et qui renclait unpossible la chute qu'il rendait Inévitable, dcja Ja terre s'amincissait autour cle lui, et la nuit, une nuit qui ne répondait plus a rien, qu il ne voyait pas ct dont il ne sentait la réalité que parce quelle était moins réelle que lu, Penvironnait.

sous foutes Jes formes, il était envahi par Vimpression détre au coeur des choses. Méme a la surface de cette terre ou il ne pouvait pénétrer, il était a Pintérieur de cette terre dont le dedans le touchait de toutes parts. De tout parts, la nuit Penfermait. Hl voyait, il entendant Pinturuté d’un infin ott il était enserré par absence méme des limites.” Blanchot began the novel mi 1982, that is, before Leyinas’s description of the iy a.

LEVINAS 99 in oneself so as to withdraw from being.” In trying to describe the il y a, Levinas encounters a methodological difficulty. For the experience of the iy a lies both beyond phenomena and beyond

the intuiting ego, and hence defies phenomenological description. Nevertheless, he suggests thal we are sometimes able to glimpse ourselves divested, as it were, of subjectivity, In deliniousness or madness “we can surprise this impersonal ‘consciousness’

into which insomnia sinks. Levinas’s use of the i/ y ais all the more interesting in the light of its relationship (or non-relationship) to the es grit, since, as I have previously mndicated, es gibt is frequently translated into

French as if y a rather than ¢a donne. He distinguishes 2 y a strongly from its Heideggerian counterpart.®’ Why so? Why does Levinas say that “it has never been either the translation, or the marking down of the German expression and of its connotations

of abundance and of generosity.” Is it because he is simply not speaking of the same phenomenon (being)? Or is it because he wishes to characterize that phenomenon so differently? I am inclined to favor the latter interpretation.” And tf it is the case that the source of plenitude or gift is not being (as the iy a) but what escapes being (the Other}, then this does away with the Heideggerian orientation of donation altogether. It remains to be seen, nevertheless, whether or not it is possible to speak of what escapes ™ Levinas, £2) 65,

Levinas, BA, OF. "Une négation qui se voudran absolue, miant tout existant—-jusqu'a Pexislant quoest ki pensée elfectuant cette négation méme—ne sauralt mettre fin a la

‘scene’ Loujours ouverte de tue, de Pétre au sens verbal éire anouyme quan cun élant ne revendique, étre sans ¢tants ou sans &tres, incessant ‘remuec-anénage’ pour reprendre une mectaphore de Blanchot, 7 ¥ ¢ impersounel, comme

un i) pleut’ ou un ‘i Fait uit. Terme fonerrement distince du ‘es mebt’ [see] heideggericn. I] n’a jamais été ui la traduction, ni la démarque de Vexpression allemande et de secs connotations d'abondance et de gtnérasité.”” Levinas, De Pexistence d Vexistaad, 2nd ed. (Paris: L’écition du poche, 1990), LO.

" This is supported by a comment from Peperzak: “[Levinas] is not at all cominced of the generosity that other thinkers hear in ‘fs edt,’ and prefers to stress the dark, threatening, and chaotic side of the indeterminate iy a” Peperzak, 8, 167. Its also supported by Marion in £2, im the quote from that work at 283 which | used earlier: “Ou plutét dues gibt, que vous tradiuisoms—ou plutat ne tradiuisons pas—par un ily a, ol manque Justement la commotation du Geben, du donner”

60 RETHINKING GOD AS GIFT being. In sum, contrary to Heidegger, Levinas puts forward the thesis that the history of philosophy has been dominated by ontology, and that the project of ontology is doomed to failure. Instead of following the ontological path, Levinas suggests that we pursue a genuine metaphysics, one that has an eye, or perhaps an ear, for transcendence and the ethical.

A LEVINASIAN METAPHYSICS

Levinas characterizes metaphysics as a radical aiming at exteriority (transascendence), an exteriority that is beyond our theoretical comprehension, beyond the realm of being and of knowledge,

beyond what can be reduced to the Same."! This exteriority is transcendent, but it is not a transcendent object. Levinas claims that intentionality, “where thought remains an adequation with the object,” is not the primary operation of consciousness.© By way Of illustration, he indicates that there are many occasions when intentionality encounters a frustrating resistance in its quest

to reduce all otherness to the Same. These areas of resistance include subjectivity itself (and here Levinas demonstrates the fail-

ure even of the phenomenological method he frequently employs}, the Other, the future, death, the Infinite, and God. Levinas will seek to show that all these areas have a meaning that is irreducible to conscious experience. He will seek to show that * Levinas, Tf, 21 ft.

" Levinas, 77, 28-29. ‘The metaphysical movement is transcendent, and transcendence, like desire and inadequation, is necessarily a transascendence.” TI, 35. Levinas takes the term “transascendence” from Jean Wahl, as he acknowledges in the accompanying footnote. Wahl's influence on Levinas is significant, especially with regard to “the metaphysical experience,” as Levinas makes clear in the essay ‘‘Jean Wahl: Neither Having nor Being,” Outside the Subject, trans. Michael B. Smith (London: Athlone Press, 1993), 67-83. Levinas notes, for example, Wahl’s speaking of ‘‘[a] disproportion to oneself that concretely signifies subjectivity: desire, quest, dialectic. But a dialectic without synthesis: without

repose, without totality, without closure, without conclusion” (74); or that “Wahl’s metaphysical experience is the Jeyend before the here; before the here, and farther away than any yonder that could be posited as another here” (75), The Metaphysical Expenence is the title of one of Wahl’s publications (Paris: Flammarion, 1965). & Levinas, Ti, 27.

LEVINAS 61 the beyond being can signify, without our thereby grasping it in knowledge. In so doing, he will be repeatedly forced to recognize that speaking about the beyond being involves using the language of being. Therefore, in Levinas’s work we find ourselves in a constant tension between saying and unsaying. In trying to say the otherwise than being, it must also be unsaid."* I will proceed by focusing on the question of signification as it relates lo subjectivity,

the Other, and God. With regard to subjectivity, it seems there have been numerous attempts to establish its frm foundation. Consistent in many of these attempts has been the equation of subjectivity with seli-consciousness, with presence to self. And yet subjectivity still seems elusive. The notion of subjectivity is now prone to the same critique to which other metaphysical concepts have recently been exposed. So we find that in contemporary terms, subjectivity is self-deconstructing.” Is it still possible to ask about the identity of the subject? A reading of Levinas would suggest that it is, provided

we are prepared to relinquish the idea that subjectivity rests secure in self-presence.“ According to Levinas, the origins of subjectivity lie prior to consciousness, in immemortiality. Subjecuvity is hever present at its own origin; it is not self-constituting.” Levilas arrives at this principle by way of an analysis of time, and he expresses It in three interconnected ways. Especially in his earlier works, Levinas speaks of the hypostasis 6 Levinas, OBBE, 7. Levinas adverts here to his ongoing conversation with Derrida on the problems of using language to specify what cannot be specified. see Kearney, DCCT, 64. “See Simon Critchley and Peter Dews, eds., Deconstructing Subjectivities (Albany: SUNY Press, 1996) [hereafter Critchley and Dews, DS]; and Eduardo Cadava, Peter Connor, and Jean-Luc Nancy, cds., Who Comes After the Subject? (London: Routledge, 1991) [hereafter Cadava ct al., WCAS]. * Levinas here responds to Husserl, who, as we have seen, places a great deal of weight on self-presence and therefore selfadenuty. But the distinction between identity and selfadentity, which will be observed in the ensuing discussion of Levinas on subjectivity, is also a Heideggerian distinction. Heidegger distinguishes zdentsch (rom seliag. His wanslators point out that the two words mean virtually the same thing in ordinary German, but they seem to mean in Heidegger “identical” and “‘sclfsame,”” respectively. In this way Heidegger is able to

reinforce his distinclion between the authentic and the inauthentic self. See

Heidegger, BT, 150, 168. See also Martin Heidegger, Identity and Difference, trans. Joan Stambaugh (New York: Harper and Row, 1969).

With thanks to Michael Fagenblat for his explanauon in this regard.

62 RETHINKING GOD AS GIFT of the subject in its emergence from impersonal being.” The event of hypostasis involves the taking up of being: the I becomes

an ego or posited subject through taking a position. In other words, Levinas suggests a duality between the ego and the self. Because of the time lag that occurs as the evo takes up the self, the ego is always slightly out of step with itself. Another way in

which Levinas asserts that the subject is not self-constituting comes out of his criticism of Husserl’s notion that all acts of Intuition ultimately involve some form of doxic representation. Levinas maintains that the priority attributed to theoretical consciousness does not give an adequate account of aesthetic and practical intuition. In Totality and Infinity he speaks of an irreduc-

ible basis of affectivity or bodiliness, an enjoyment of life or a “™“Hypostasis, an existent, is a consciousness, because consciousness 1s localised and posited, and through the act without transcendence of taking a position it cones to bemg out of itself, and already takes refuge m itself from Being in self.” Levinas, Eh, 83. What does Levinas mean by this taking of a position? Llewelyn discusses hypostasis extensively in ALGE at 27-5). Peperzak (discussing OBE) observes: “In Levinas’ view, Spinoza, Hegel, Heidegger, and their numerous followers, recluce the subject to the anonymous essence, of which they are only functions, imstead of recognizing the subject as ‘sub-stance’ or hypostasis whose self cannot be lost m Being. The description of hypostasis was already a central topic in Levinas’ first book, Pron Bxistence to Existents. In later works, the expression does not frequently occur, but the separation between the subject— who 1s “me’ as well as ‘ego’—and Being, remains a basic thesis. The difference between Saying and Said is a new way of stressing that separation: in Saying the subject expresses its nondialectical difference froin Being, that 1s, from all that can be gathered in the Said.” Peperzak, B, 117. 1 find Peperzak's comments helpful, although they do not explain the how of hypostasis. Levunas’s discussion with Philippe Nemo in Ethique et infin (1982; Paris: Livre de pache, 1996), 3743, suggests that Levinas is not enurely comfortable with his early attempts to discuss the separation of the T from impersonal Being. There he speaks of a laier strategy, where less than the subject positioning itself, it is constituted as dispossessecL in responsibility for the Other. This makes a certain amount of sense, 10 that melividuation ts always at the cost of becoming responsible, and so of being “dispossessed.” Becoming an J is always about finding oneself already “there.” or already having been “thrown,” to use Heidegger's word. The split of which Levinas speaks is a valid one, and it could as easily be seen in Derrida’s idea that the subject can never be present 1o itself. In Levinas perhaps it is not so much a matter of escaping the 7/4 a—as if we could be fully separate from it—but only of finding oneself precariously suspended in it. This interpretation would accord, F think, with a reading of EE. Another point Lo note i passing 1s that the i y @ has a sense of immemoriality to it, and this must lead to some confusion in making any identification of a trace or a call.

LEVINAS 63 suffering need that always precedes conscious contemplation.” Yet bodiliness is still not the distinctive basis of my identity. A third means of illustration occurs in Levinas’s treatment of the failure of phenomenology to observe the genesis of consciousness. In Husserl’s phenomenology, and in a very particular sense, consciousness is constitutive of the world. But can consciousness

constitute itself? Despite his best efforts to maintain that it can and does, Husser! is always left with a “primal impression,” an irreducible residue of subjectivity.”* Levinas will focus on this resi-

due as an indication that subjectivity exceeds the boundaries of knowledge and being.” We are left with an approach to subjectiv-

ity that rests on diachrony, on a disturbance in time, a rupture. The ego is never perfectly synchronized with the self, 1s never present to itself, and does not constitute itself, My subjectivity 1s both immemorial in origin and invested in me from beyond me. This insight enables Levinas to make two important claims: that subjectivity is created ancl that my subjectivity is only awakened by

the other person. Immemoriality ts frequently observed in any one of three forms in Levinas: as diachrony, as anachronism, or as the immemorial past.”? As early as Lxistents and Existence, Levinas speaks of effort

taking on “the instant, breaking and tying back together again the thread of me,” the ‘knot’ of the present, or “the engagement in bemg on the basis of the present, which breaks, and then ties back, the thread of infinity.’ These nmages form the basis of Levinas’s understanding that the present is never a pure present, but always interrupted by the past and the future. Synchrony is a dream: there is only diachrony. Nevertheless, diachrony ts not simply a device that mimes the Heideggerian temporal ecstases. Through it, Levinas wants to refer not to “the past” that can be recuperated by memory in the present, but to a past “which has Life is love of afe, a relation with contents that are not my bemg but more dear than my being: thinking, cating, sleepmg, reading, working, warming oncself in the sun.”’ Levinas, 77, 112. 7? See Ricoeur's discussion in HAP, especially at 11 Off. STLevinas, OBBE, 32-34, See Kevin Hart, The Dark Gaze: Maunce Blanchot and Imends (forthcoming). > Levinas, Elke, 33, 78, 99.

64 RETHINKING GOD AS GIFT never been present.” He asks: “But how, at the still temporal breaking point where being comes lo pass, would being and time fall into ruins so as to disengage subjectivity from its essence?” In other words, the past of which Levinas wishes to speak is a past where there can be no memory, a more “original” past than the

simple past. “There must be signaled a lapse of time that does not return, a diachrony refractory to all synchronization, a transcending diachrony.”” This is the immemorial past.** Immemoriality is behind the idea that the ego is always out of step with itself,

at its very origin.” It has the meaning of a past that has never been present either to me or to anyone else. But immemoriality also has to do with my relationship with the Other. The Other is the locus of the call to responsibility that constitutes me, a call that is itself immemorial. “In consciousness, this ‘who knows where’ is translated into an anachronical overwhelming, the antecedence of responsibility and obedience with respect to the order received or the contract.’""" In this sense, immemoriality is also

transcendental. Yet further, the Other can never be present to me, and in this way 1mmemortality assumes the sense of a past that has never been present fo me. There are thus three names for immemoriality and three possibilities for understanding it, each of which, I believe, ts valid at different moments in Levinas’s work. The immemorial is the rupture in my own present by my irretrievable origin; it is the transcendental call of the Other that constitutes me at that irretrievable origin; and it is what characterizes

my relationship to the Other, whose present (and whose past) escapes me irretrievably. To return to the question of subjectivity, if the origin of subjectivity is tmmemorial, how can it signify? If the origin of subjectivity * Levinas, OBBE, 9. ” Levinas, OBBE, 9.

Levinas, OBBE, 24: “A past more ancient than any present, a past which was

never present and whose anarchical antiquity was never given in the play of dissimulations and manifestations, a past whose other signification remains to be described, signifies over and beyond the manifestation of being, which would thus convey but a moment of this signifying signification.”’ m “In the identity of self-presence—in the silent tautology of the prereflexive—lies an avowal of difference between the same and the same, a disphasure,

a difference at the heart of inumacy.” Emmanuel Levinas, “Philosophy and Awakening,” in Cadava et al., WCAS, 212. *? Levinas, OBBF, 13.

LEVINAS 65 is prior to consciousness and irrecuperable by memory, can I speak of identity? Levinas’s answer is that it is my responsibility for the Other that makes me unique. Prior to my consciousness, prior to my freedom, and in my utter passivity, the Other invests me with subjectivity by calling me to responsibility.*' I only become Jin responding “Here Iam” to the Other who calls. Subjectivity signifies as responsibility, as my substitution for the Other as

a hostage. We turn now to consider in more detail what Levinas has to say about the other person.*? Fundamental is the sense that the Other is utterly transcendent. While much of Western philosophy tends to think of the Other in terms of the Same, that is, as an alter ego who is accessible by way of empathy or by virtue of their equality with me, Levinas makes absolute the distance of alterity. [ simply

cannot grasp the Other in knowledge, for the Other 1s infinite and overflows the totality of comprehension and of being. Infinity

is “given” in my experience of the Other as utterly beyond and in excess of me. Who the other person “is” can never be present to me: our presents are never synchronous. At one stage Levinas suggests that the Other inhabits a future I can never reach, and this seems to be an effective way of describing the relationship.“ But in his later works, he tends to focus on the past dimension of diachrony, perhaps because he wishes to emphasize the priority of the Other as the one who invests me with subjectivity. [t may also be because he wishes to distance himself from Heidegger, who emphasizes the future in temporal ecstasis.** What are we to ‘! See, for example, Levinas, OBBE, 10. @ See Levinas, OBB, 135.

1] have indicated above that Levinas distinguishes between autre and autrut, a distinction that is rendered in translation as other/Other. But Levinas also distinguishes between méme and autre, the same (often the first person) and the other, and itis difficult to translate this “other.” “4 See Levinas, TA, and the excerpt in Hand, The Levinas Reader, 45. Derrida

speaks of “the movement and time of fnendship” as an “undeniable future anterior, the absolute of an unpresentable past as well as a future.”’ Jacques Derrida, Polties of Frendship, trans. George Collins (London: Verso, 1997), 249-50 [hereafter Derrida, PF]. The link between future and immemorial past is made well here. % kKmmanuel Levinas, “The Trace of the Other,” Deconstruction im Context, ed. Mark C. Taylor (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1986), 345-59, 346 [hereafter Levinas, TO].

66 RETHINKING GOD AS GIET make of this absolute transcendence? The difficulty it suggests is how the Other, completely unknowable, can nevertheless signify lo me at all. Moreover, there is the problem of how 1, presumably an Other for Another, signify for that Other. How does the space of our “relationless relation” finection?*® Levinas uses two mechanisms to work out the problem of the signification of the Other, and these basically correspond to the chronology of his two major works, fotality and Infinity and Otherwise Than Being or Beyoud Essence. In Totatity and Infinity, the Other

signifies in the face. The face of the Other operates in Levinas’s thought like a valve. lts phenomenality is always exceeded by its removal to transcendence. He suggests this removal when he speaks of the trace in the face: it is a removal beyond being to a third order that 1s neither presence nor absence but otherness. Levinas calls this third order illeity. *7 When things are given to me in vision, I exercise power over them. But this is not so with the face, which cannot be encompassed. The alterity of the Other is not just relative, as though we were different but somehow inhabiting the same plane. And further, this alterity does not just negate the [, since such negation would again imply our mutual existence within a larger relation, Instead, the Other proceeds as

an epiphany that comes to me from utterly elsewhere.** The Other 1s completely otherwise, and this difference is evinced in speech. Here we find the beginnings of an alternative model of signifi* Levinas, 27 80: “a relation without relation.”

“ TA] wace signihes beyond being, The personal order to which a face obliges us is bevond being, Beyond beng es a third person, which is not definable

by the oneself, by ipseity, [tis the possibility of this third direction of radical vunghiness Which escapes the bipolar play of ymmanence and transcendence proper to being, where imimanence wins against transcendence. Through a trace the irreversible past takes on the profile of a “He.” The éeyerd from which a face comes is mm the third person. The pronoun /fe expresses exactly its inexpressible irreversibility, alreach escaping every relation as well as every dissimulation, and in this sense absolutely unencompassable or absolute, a transcendence

In an ab-solute past. The ey of the chircl person is the condition for the izreversibility.” Levinas, 70, 356. See Mark C. Tavlor’s discussion of the trace in Altanty (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1987), 208, On Derrida’s “trace,” see Geollrcy Bennington, in Geoffrey Bennington and faeques Derrida, facgites Dernda (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1993), 74-75. “Levinas, 77, 19-4.

LEVINAS 07 cation, the one Levinas developed more fully n response to criti-

cisms that “the face’ was too phenomenal a device to refer us to transcendence, which is presented in Otherwise Than Being.” In that work, Levinas speaks more of the proximity of the Other

in Saying, rather than the Other's face." According to the ‘‘proximity” model, I am exposed to the Other. “Responsibility for the other, in its antecedence to my freedom, its antecedence to the present and to representation, 1s a passivily more passive than all passivity, an exposure to the other without this exposure being assumed, an exposure without holding back, exposure of exposedness, expression, saying. ”’ Exposure is “saying

uncovering itself.*? In the exposure of proximity, the Other signifies through Saying. Language relates separated terms without reducing them to the Same: through words the Other can appear to be thematized, but in speaking the Other at the same time evades this thematization.” The Other to whom I ascribe meaning will always contest that meaning.”’ As soon as |

convert the Other’s Saying into an intelligible Said, I have already corrupted the epiphany. While I can have a relationship with the Other in discourse, I do not thereby compromise the Other’s absoluteness. Whereas in representation I have power This is Derrida’s criticism i “Violence and Metaphysics” [hereafter Derrida, VM, in Derrida, WD, 79-153. See also Peperzak, 7770, 136. “ Peperzak suggests the move in T7O, 181-82, 212, and in B, 80. Something

of the connection between paths can be observed in Levinas’s comment: “A trace 1s sketched out and effaced in a face in the equivocation of a saying.” OBBE, 12. In that work, an entire chapter is devoted to the question of proximity (O1ff.).

"Levinas, OBBE, 15. * Levinas, OBBE, 15. See also Peperzak, 770, 221.

* Levinas uses the Saying/Said disunction in TY, for example: “To the one the other can indeed present himself as a theme, but his presence is not reabsorbed in his status as a theme. The word that bears upon the Other as a theme seems to contain the Other. But already it is said to the Other who, as interlocutor, has quit the theme that encompassed him, and upsurges inevitably behind the said.” Levinas, 77, 195. But it is much more important for him in OBBE. See, for example, 34-51. “4 “The formal structure of language thereby announces the ethical mviolability of the Other and, without any odor of the “numinous, his ‘holiness.’ ” Levinas, 17, 195. “The said, contesung the abdication of the saying that evervwhere occurs in this said, thus maintains the diachrony in which, holding its breath, the spirit hears the echo of the otherwise.” Levinas, OBBE, 44.

68 RETHINKING GOD AS GIFT over the Other, in discourse the Other puts me in question.”® The Other remains an enigma rather than becoming a phenomenon.”®

While proximity and Saying resolve to some extent the difficulties involved with the face, the question of how I encounter the Other still remains. For Levinas wants to say that I do not inhabit

the same space as the Other: the Other does not belong to the economy of Being.*’ So in Levinas’s work we find that there is an

emphasis on the asymmetry of the relationship.» The Other is always above me. “Height” is an important metaphor for Levinas: For Desire this alterity, non-adequate to the idea, has a meaning. It is understood as the alterity of the Other and of the Most-High. The very dimension of height is opened up by metaphysical Desire. That this height is no longer the heavens but the Invisible is

the very elevation of height and its nobility.’ Levinas speaks of “curved space’: “this curvature of the intersubjective space inflects distance into elevation; 1t does not falsify being, but makes ” “For the ethical relationship which subtends discourse is not a species of consciousness whose ray emanates from the I; it puts the T in question. This putting 1n question emanates from the other.” Levinas, 77%, 195. “To maintain that the relationship with a neighbor, incontestably set up in saying, is a responsibility for the neighbor, that saying is to respond to another, is to find no longer any limit or measure for this responsibility, which ‘in the memory of man’ has never been contracted, and ts found to be at the mercy of the freedom and the fate, unverifiable by me, of the other man. It is to catch sight of an extreme passivity, a passivity that is not assumed, in the relationship with the other, and, paradoxically, in pure saving itself. The act of saying will turn out to have been Introduced here from the start as the supreme passivity of exposure to another, which 3s responsibility for the free initiatives of the other. Whence there is an ‘version’ of intentionality which, for its part, always preserves before deeds accomplished cnough ‘presence of mind’ to assume them. There is an abandon Of sovereign and active subjectivity.” Levinas, OBBE, 47. The “inversion of intentronality’ of which Levinas speaks here will be most significant when it comes to Jean-Luc Marion.

See Levinas, £P. especially the introduction to the essay by Robert Bernasconi, who observes Levinas’s increased awareness of the problem of presence and ontology and his use of the device of Immemuoriality. 7 On Levinas and economy, see TI, 175ff. % Levinas, T7215, ™ Levinas, 77, 34-35. “The being that presents himself in the face comes from

a dimension of height, a dimension of transcendence whereby he can present hunself as a stranger without opposing me as an obstacle or an enemy.” Levinas, TT, 215,

LEVINAS 69 its truth first possible’; ‘‘this “curvature of space’ expresses the relation between human beings.”’'"’ In other words, the Other is removed from me by virtue of a curvature of space that prevents

my “apprehension” (read comprehension) of him or her. According to such an image, and adapting Levinas’s own metaphor of prophecy, I could hear the voice of the Other without “seeing” the Other. Yet such absolute asymmetry is problematic because it leaves no prospect for my own alterity for the Other. [t breaks down the possibility of any general application of Levinas’s thinking. And this is exactly how Levinas desires it to be, emphasizing my own, always greater, share of the responsibilty. There can be no reciprocity. While Levinas develops a different mechanism for the functioning of a community and the need for jusuce (based on a “third” person), the meeting with the Other only works one way.'!"! Perhaps the idea of absolute asymmetry is well suited to the contemplation of God, but it does not sit easily in the human context. Far better would be Maurice Blanchot’s doubly curved space of ‘double dissymmetry.”""" Turning, then, to the question of God, for Levinas meaningful speech about God tests the limits of philosophy. God signifies beyond philosophy. And yet, that does not mean the language of

faith is any more helpful. The beyond being is not simply the realm of faith, and itis certainly not accessible by way of a negative

theology, for negative theology is still tied to being even as its w? Levinas, TY, 291.

Levinas, OBBE, 16: “The act of consciousness is motivated by the presence of a third party alongside of the neighbor approached. A third party is also approached; and the relationship between the neighbor and the third party cannot be indifferent to me when I approach. There must be a justice among incomparable ones. There must then be a comparison between incomparables and a synopsis, a togetherness and contemporaneousness; there must be thematization, thought, history and inscription.” ' See Maurice Blanchot, Vhe Mnfinite Conversation, ans. Susan Hanson (Minneapolis: Unwersity of Minnesota Press, 1993), 73 [hereafter Blanchot. JC): “The neutral relation, a relation without relation, can be indicated in yet another manner: the relation of the one to the other is doubly dissymmetrical. We have recoenised this several times. We know—al least in one sense—that the absence between the ane and the other is such that the relations, if they could be unfolded, would be those of a nen-womorphic field in which point A would be distant from pomt B by a distance other than pornt B's distance from point A; a distance excluding reciproaty and presenting curvature whose rrregulerity extends to the point of disrantimuity.”

70 RETHINKING GOD AS GIFT absence presupposes a presence. For Levinas, both faith and philosophy are bound to ontology.’ He opposes Infinity to the total-

ity of being, and when he speaks about God, it is in terms of Infinity. Picking up Descartes’s “Idea of the Infinite,” Levinas posits that it breaks up consciousness, that it exceeds the capacity of consciousness to contain it, and that it defies the grasp of intenuonality.'™ The idea of God also functions in this way. When Levinas speaks of the idea of the Infinite, we may be less

than convinced by his apparently Cartesian argument that it 1s introduced into thought. This surely sounds like a lapse into a proof for the existence of God, and while Levinas disputes that he is interested in proofs, if the Infinite ze God, then we have come no further in Levinas than in Descartes. However, some important distinctions may enable us to continue with Levinas. These are distinctions that can be made between transcendence, the Transcendent (or transcendental signified}, and the transcendental. The first term (transcendence) 1s the opposite of immia-

nence, and so means that which les beyond myself or is irreducible to personal experience, The second term (the Transcendent) is related to the first, in that the Lranscendent ts that which lies bevond consciousness. But it has been capitalized to suggest its difference from simple transcendence: the Transcendent is that which 1s not only not reducible to unmanence, but 1s posited as beyond the world as such. (In Kant’s sense, the [T]ran-

scendent is that beyond the limits of any possible experience.) The Transcendent thus easily becomes another name for God. It 3A pelicious thought which appeals to religious experiences allegedly independent of philosophy already, mmasmuch as it is Founded on experience, reters io the ‘LT think,’ and is wholly connected on to philosophy.” Levinas, GP, 172.

m“Tris not the proofs of Gad’s existence that matter to us here, but the break-up of consciousness, which is not a repression into the unconscious, but a sobering up or an awakening, jolling the “dogmatic slumber’ which sleeps at the bottom of every consciousness resting on its object. The idea of God, the cogitatum of a cogitatio which to begin with contaius that cogitatio, signifies the non-contamed par excellence. 1s not that the very absolution of the absolute? It overflows every capacity; the ‘objective reality’ of the cogefatian breaks up the formal reality of the cogitatio. This perhaps overturns, in advance, the universal validity and primordial character of intentionality, We will say that the idea of God breaks up the thought which is an investment, a synopsis and a synthesis, and can only enclose in a presence, re-present, reduce to presence or le-be.” Levinas, GP, 173.

LEVINAS 71 might be possible to relate Derrida’s “transcendental signified” to this definition of the ‘Transcendent, since when God 1s thought as the Transcendent, it is often to make possible and to guarantee

the operation of “the system” from a point external to it. The third term (the transcendental) is to be understood with a Kantian-Derridean inflection (aud is used in distinction from the “transcendentals” of medieval theology). The transcendental in Kant’s sense is that which “establishes, and draws consequences from, the possibility and limits of experience.”'"’ The transcendental in Derrida’s sense (to which we should rightly refer as the quasi-transcendental) is the condition of possibility and imposstbility for meaning, which, without delaying further with the details here, is infinite interpretability. The point of making these distinctions is to help in identifying what is going on in Levinas’s work. Is he, in suggesting that God signifies in the Infinite, (a) affirming belief in God as the Infinite (the Transcendent causes the idea of the Infinite), or (b) suggest-

ing that God may or may not be the source of the Infinite (the experience of the Infinite is given in transcendentality, and so its origin cannot be conclusively determined)? It seems to me that he is taking the latter option, which puts the Transcendent in question without removing it as an option for faith. There 1s no guarantee of the divine origin of the idea, no question of proof, no definite slippage from transcendentality to the transcendental signified, although it might be said that Levinas does move between transcendentality and God as utterly transcendent, if not the Transcendent. As we have seen, Levinas wants to indicate that the totality of being is interrupted by being’s “otherwise,” Infin-

ity. And since to speak outside the realm of being is to speak outside the realm of any sort of proof, all we are left with phenomenally is the expertence of interruption. So when Levinas says that the idea of the Infinite overflows consciousness, it 1s not that he

can define the content of the Infinite, but only that he can locate a resistance to Intenfionality, Levinas will say that the Infinite signifies as a trace, as a mark of erasure that is suggestive but which

proves nothing.'™ With regard to the question of God, then, it 1" The Cambrdge Dictionary af Philosophy, ed. Robert Audi (Caimbridge: Cambridge University Press, 1995), 807. ™ See Levinas, £0, 356-59.

72 RETHINKING GOD AS GIFT seems to nie that Levinas is saying that if we want to speak of God,

the language of Infinity is the only one remotely available to us. As it happens, the language of Infinity or of God will reter us back to infinite relationships between people. which Levinas describes as religion.'"’ Brit the Infinite may or may not be God. If we use Derrida’s terms, it is undecidable. Further, it can as easily be intro-

duced into consciousness by way of the Other as by God. The origin of the idea rests in the same primal scene as the origin of our subjectivity. Tt is immemorial. So when Levinas says that we

are created, and this he does frequently, he never specifies the source of that creation. Is it possible to have a relationship with the Infinite? Levinas will answer yes, although it will be a relationship that has no ground and no goal. It will be a relationship characterized by desire, an tnfinite desire that cannot find satisfaction in an Infinite term. It will involve, on our part, a movement of transcendence, but not a movement that will reach the Transcendent.'” How then does the Infinite signify, if not as the Transcendent goal of our desirey In my judgment the Infinite signifies in two ways. It signifies in the other person, as illeity, as desirability, as a

trace. And it signifies in me, as goodness, as cthics, as kenotic love. This will require some explanation, If I may address the second point first, that the Infinite signifies in me, it will be casier to explore how the Infinite signifies in the Other. The signification of the Infinite in me occurs as the conversion of desire. Although “conversion” is not a word that Levinas himself uses, I find it quite helpful in trying to understand the process he describes. My desire is for the Infinite. But the Infinite cannot

be obtained in desire, for that would reduce it to immanence. 87 While im relationship the distance between the self and the Other is traversed, 11 is still mamtainec as distance. In conversation, the egoism of the I reiains, but the right of the Other over me is recognized in apology. Totality is dractured not through the exercise of thought as such, but through the encounler with the face and through speech. The connection that is so formed Levinas

calls “religion,” This connection, in which the Other is able to remam completely other, resists too the totalization of history. See Levinas, 77, 40. Ms See the avant propos to Emmanuel Levinas, De Diew qui vient a Cidée, 2nd ed, (1986; Paris: Vrin, 1992), especially at 11-12. See also Levinas, GP, 179ff., where he reworks his ideas starting from proximity. iM See Levinas, GP. 177.

LEVINAS a3 My desire must therefore become disinterested: I must desire the Infinite without desiring it. How is that possible? It is possible only if my desire is converted. This conversion occurs when my desire for the Infinite becomes desire for what Levinas says is “the unde-

sirable par excellence—the Other.”''? My substitution for the Other, my love for the Other, which Levinas insists 1s “without Eros” and which we might suggest is thus kenotic, my ethical response to the Other—this is the meaning of goodness.'"’ Thus we are enabled to explain why Levinas also refers to the Infinite as ‘the Good beyond Being.” The Infinite signifies in goodness. In the Infinite we are referred to the Good. There is no doubt that we will hear echoes of Christian theol-

ogy here, and I am not altogether sure that Levinas, although Jewish, wishes to exclude them. In fact, Levinas frequently quotes from the New Testament. And the richness of his own scriptural

tradition shows itself in his subsequent discussion of what we would identify as theological themes: glory, witness, inspiration, and prophecy. He tells us: “The subject as a hostage has been neither the experience nor the proof of the Infinite, but a witness born of the Infinite, a modality of this glory, a testimony that no disclosure has preceded.”'" In my responsibility for the Other, I can never be responsible enough. My responsibility increases asymptotically: as 1 am called to empty myself more completely,

to substitute myself for the Other more fully, the glory of the Infinite is amplified, Levinas insists that inspiration, or prophecy, is the way the Infinite passes in the finite, and in passing, constitutes my very psyche immemorially. My awakening to subjectivity, which is an ethical response to the cry of the Other, bears witness to the glorious passing of the [nfinite, testimony prior to disclo-

sure!

The signification of the Infinite in the Other occurs as illeity. Illeity indicates the way that the face of the Other opens onto Infinity: the reference it contains to the third person suggests not that we are to think of the Infinite es a third person behind the 1° Levinas, GP, 177. Note that ‘“autrur’ in the French text indicates that the Other is indicated, rather than the “other” given in the translated version. '! Levinas, GP, 178. N12 Levinas, GP, 182. MM Levinas, GP, 184.

74 RETIINKING GOD AS GIFT Other, but that in the third person, Infinity passes in the Other. Levinas tells us: ‘“We have designated this way for the Infinite, or

for God, to refer, from the heart of its desirability, to the nondesirable proximity of Others, by the term ‘illeity.’”” By illeity, Levinas invokes “the hein the depth of the you,” the desirable in the undesirable.'' In this way we see that the two moments of signification are joined. The Infinite signifies both in the conversion of my desire and in what we might call, with some reservations, a conversion of desirability. The passing of the Infinite in the finite can only ever signify as a trace. [t is immemorial: it will always already have passed when

we are able to advert to it.'* The Infinite is never present to us, never in range of proof, never able to be grasped in knowledge. That it is God who has passed as the Infinite will ultimately be a question for faith. According to Levinas, if we are able to speak of

God, then ethics ts the meaning to which we might refer, not because ethics ts a practical replacement for spiritual commiltment, but because it is in the heart of ethics that God signifies. For Levinas there is no other way to desire God than in desiring the Other, for whom I am utterly responsible.

After such a long excursus on the thought of Levinas, what might be said specifically on Levinas and the questions of what 1s

given, and according to what horizon? Levinas both continues and departs from the tradition he inherits from Husserl. Both emphasize the givenness of phenomena, but Levinas wants to allow for the possibility of phenomena that are not given according to any horizon. Further, this exclusion of any horizon against which, for example, the Other is given, means that Levinas rejects the Heideggerian emphasis on being’s ultimacy. Consequently,

being is not seen as the source of all goodness and plenitude, even as it gives itself. Instead, Levinas refers us to “the good beyond being” (Plato’s to agathon epekeina tes ousiasy. With regard to

the possibility of a signification that cannot be reduced to the 14 Levinas, GP. 178. U5 “Tmemorial” here will he in the sense of relationally immemeorial—God is never present to meas such. But we could think the passing of God as transcendentally immemorial as well, if we choose to suggest that the call to responsibility might come from God and therefore might constitute ine, This would be in accord with Levinas’s thinking of ‘‘creatureliness.”’

LEVENAS ere dimensions of any horizon, Levinas utilizes the figures of the trace, the Saying, the immemorial, and the Infinite to suggest meaning without comprehension. Additionally, he emphasizes not the visual (usually associated with understanding) but the aural (rich with connotations of prophecy): this is perhaps behind his move from the signification of the face to the signification of the Saying. DERRIDA AND LEVINAS

To hear Derrida speak of Levinas is to hear him speak with the greatest reverence of someone whose influence upon him has been immeasurable.''“ That is not to say that Derrida is not also critical of Levinas’s work, but it is clear that, especially insofar as Levinas seeks to embrace the ethical, Derrida has come to think in solidarity with him." {n the course of my discussion of Levinas 1 have already made several references to Derrida, and I wish to limit my discussion here to two interrelated points, each arising in “Violence and Metaphysics.” I would like to consider the general idea of a “beyond” in Levinas and how this might be read by

Derrida. Then I would like to consider one of the specific crit " Derrida, Ad, 16: “je voudrais seulement rendre grace a celui dont la pensée, Pannué, la confiance, la ‘bonte’... auront été pour moi, comme pour tani (autres, une source vivante, st vivanite, sl constante, que je n’arrive pas a penser ce quia lai arrive ou ovarrive auourd hua, a savoir l’mterruption, une certame nonmréepunse dans unc réponse qui n’en finira januus pour moi, tant que je vivrai” (ET would like only to thank the one whose thought, friendship, conhdence, ‘goodness’... will have been for me, as for so many others, a living scnirce, so living, so constant, that F can’t think what happens to him or to me today, that is to sav Lhe interruption, a certaim non-response in a response which will never end for me, as long as [ live’), The adimiration goes both ways: see Levinas’s essay on Derrida in Proper Names, trans. Michael B. Smith (London: Athlone Press, 1996) [hereafter Levinas, PN}. "7 Derrida initially sees that deconstruction threatens cthics. See the discussion in La Communication (Montréal: Ediuon Montmorency, 1973), 426. Yet he comes to see an cthical bent in deconstructive activity itself. See, for example, simon Critchley, Phe Ethics of Deconstruction: Dernda and Levinas (Oxford: Black-

well, 1992) [hereatter Critchley, EDDL]; or Critchley’s essay “Derrida: Private lronist or Public Liberal?” Deconstruction and Pragmatism, ed. Chantal Mouffe (London: Routledge, 1996), 19-40 (hereafter Mouffe, DP]. See also the discussion by Richard Kearney in “Derrida’s Ethical Return,” Working Through Derrida, ec. Gary B. Madison (Evanston: Northwestern University Press, 1993), 28-50.

76 RETHINKING GOD AS GIFT cisms he makes of Levinas concerning the signification of the face.

Thinking beyond any horizon necessarily implies thinking something according to a newer horizon. Could it be said of Levinas that in thinking beyond being he simply reinscribes a further

horizon for the given, the horizon of the good or the ethical? This criticism has several dimensions. It relates to Levinas and the use of horizons, and as we have seen, Levinas tries to avoid think-

ing in horizonal terms. With his allusion to “curved space, he tries, | suspect, to give the sense that the Other cannot be framed by any horizon. In Totality and Infinity he observes: “Since Husserl the whole of phenomenology is the promotion of the idea of hori-

zon, which for it plays a role equivalent to that of the concept in classical idealism; an existent arises upon a ground that extends beyond it, as an individual arises from a concept.”!'* And he includes Heidegger, who “posits in advance this ground of being as the horizon on which every existent arises, as though the horizon,

and the idea of limit it includes and which is proper to vision, were the ultimate structure of relationship.”"' That he tries to exclude reference to a horizon, nevertheless, does not mean that Levinas himself does not employ one. For Levinas asks that we encounter the Other according to responsibility, and this condition effectively becomes the horizon in which relationship is made possible. Yet at the same time, Levinas consistently refuses to specify that horizon. One never knows, with Levinas, what responsibility means, for that would be to put in place a meta-ethics, something like a Kantian categorical imperative; 1t would be to

destroy the possibility of a unique and irreducible response. If Levinas puts a horizon in place, he srmultaneously allows it to be

suspended by the transcendentality that inhabits all experience and which will characterize respect for the Saying.

The criticism also relates to the thinking of the correlates inside/outside, here/beyond, or being/being’s otherwise. Derrida observes: “However it [Levinas’s project] 1s also a question of inaugurating, in a way that is to be new, quite new, a metaphysics of radical separation and exteriority. One anucipates that this meta"8 Tevinas, Tf, 44-45. 19 Levinas, 77, 67-68.

LLEVINAS 77 physics will have some difficulty finding its language in the medium of the traditional logos entirely governed by the structure ‘inside-outside,’ “interior-exterior.’ ”’!”? Levinas assigns himself

the task of thinking beyond being, but he will find himself inscribed within being by the very language he uses to defy it. There is no escaping the violence.’*! He seeks to address this criticism in Otherwise Than Being or Beyond Essence, admitting that “betrayal” is

inevitable, but insisting that the otherwise than being does show itself, even if unfaithfully.'* The criticism finally relates to Derrida’s comments on the “hyperessential,” which, especially insofar as it concerns God, I submit

comes down to the difference between Levinas and Derrida in thinking infinity. Caputo describes these two ways with characteristic lucidity: Infinity for Derrida is not symbolic but hyperbolic infinity, as opposed to Levinas, for whom it is expressly something metaphysical and even theological, something ethico-theo-logical. The Levinasian gesture that requires deconstruction, even demythologization, is to reify this infinity, to make it a metaphysical being—which Levi-

nas then cannot call Being and will not call a mere fiction. The Levinasian gesture is like the Heideggerian to just chis extent: that it attributes actuality or reality to what it valorizes, that it claims this infinity is real, ad literam, ad infinitum. But in Derrida, the quasi infinity of undeconstructble justice is neither Being nor otherwise

than Being; the excess is not the excess of Being but the excess of linguistic performance, an excess within the operations made possible and impossible by différance, in response to the singularity lying on the edge of différance. In Derrida, infinity means a hyperbolic responsiveness and responsibility, a hyperbolic sensitivity.'?°

The two types of infinity that are being considered are, first, an infinity that bears a relation to transcendence, and possibly to the Transcendent; and second, an infinity that is related purely to transcendentality. In other words, it marks a return to the prob120 Derrida, VM, 88.

21 Derrida, VM, 91-92. See also Jacques Derrida, ““How to Avoid Speaking,” trans. Ken Frieden, Dernda and Negative Theology, ed. Harold Coward and Toby Foshay (Albany: SUNY Press, 1992), 73-142, 133 n. [hereafter Derrida, HAS]. 22 Levinas, OBBE, 6.

3 Caputo, DH, 200.

78 RETHINKING GOD AS GIFT lem of transcendentality versus the Transcendent. Is Levinas merely positing the Transcendent as the transcendental signified? it seems to me that the solution to the problem can only be found in two alternatives: either in a dogmatic assertion of a faith posiuion (one way or the other, for atheism requires as much faith as theism); or in the acceptance of undecidability, of an uncertainty that becomes the very condition of possibility for faith itself. Ac-

cording to the former, revelation overrides doubt (or a kind of empirical positivism makes belief impossible). According to the latter, | cannot prove the existence of the Transcendent, who appears according to no horizon of mine. But if God were to give Godself to me, then I could know God only in the traces that mark the human economy (marked as it is with transcendentality), or perhaps as an enigma.'™ These are the choices with which Levinas deals and, as we will come to see, the choices with which Marion is faced.'*"

And Derrida? Writing more and more in the area of religion, Derrida does not exclude the possibility of a choice for God made

in faith, provided it is not a faith that deludes itself that it can know its “object” other than according to transcendentality. In “Sauf le nom,” for example, he explores the possibilities of a negative theology read otherwise than according to the idea of an absent presence.'** Negative theology is ike a memory, testifying 4 Levinas, EP, 77: ° The relationship with the Infinite then no longer has the structure of an intentional correlation. The supreme anachronism of a past that was never a now, and the approach of the infinite through sacrifice—is the Enigma’s word.” On the enigma, see Theodor W. Adorno, Aesthetic Theory, trans. Robert HullotKentor (London: Athlone Press, 1997), 1204f. 5 And according to Graham Ward, Marion overrides bis post-metaphysical preoccupations and comes down in favor of Chnstian dogmatism. See his “The Theological Project of Jean-Luc Marion” in Post-Secutar Philosophy: Between Philosophy and Theology, ed. Phillip Blond (London: Routledge, 1998), 229-49 [hereaf-

ter Blond, PS]. In “How to Avoid Speaking” Derrida observed that “ ‘negative theology’ seems to reserve, beyond all positive predication, beyond all negation, even beyond Being, some hyperessentiality, a being beyond Being.” Derrida, //AS, 77. Derrida in that essay was largely responding to the idea that deconstruction was a type of negative theology, and negative theology did not come out too well as a result, Responding to Derrida, Kevin Wart rehabilitates negative theology, deconstructing positive theology. Hart notes that the “hyper” in “hyperessentality,” as it is used by Denys the Arcopagite, has a negative rather than positive meaning, and that it suggests a rupture of essentiality rather than a surplus. See

LEVINAS 79 to. a yet immemorial event that leaves a mark on language.'*’ One of the authorial voices in the essay describes it as a “passion that leaves the mark of a scar in that place where the impossible takes

place.”* It carries a wound, just legible, and bears witness to an unknowable God who has nothing save a name.'”” And the name is that of the unnameable nameable, the nameable beyond the name.!"" This reading of negative theology is far more Levinasian in tone, in the sense that any “God event” would be immemorial, leaving but a wound or a scar or a trace.'"’ But it is also consistent

with Derrida’s thinking of the aporia or the rupture, a thinking that avoids the more obvious pitfalls of Levinas’s language of “beyond.” 1" Returning to Derrida’s criucism of Levinas, this time concerning the phenomenality of the face, he suggests that while Levinas

wants to treat the face as a “nonphenomenal phenomenon,” he cannot but recognize it phenomenally. The face inevitably becomes the alter ego: ‘either there is only the same, which can no longer even appear and be said, nor even exercise violence (pure infinity or finitude); er indeed there is the same and the other, and then the other cannot be the other—of the same—except by being the same (as itself: ego), and the same cannot be the same (as itself: ego) except by being the other’s other: alter ego."'"' Additionally, the face cannot mark a trace of the nonphenomenal Other without that trace being in some way phenomenal, and Kevin Hart, The Trespass of the Sign (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1989), 202 {hereafter Hart, VS]. 27 Derrida, SUN, 34. 28 Dernida, SLA, 59-60.

4 Dernda, SLA, 60, 55-56, 180 Derrida, SIN, 58.

')““Immemorial” here would possibly refer us more to the transcendental than to the Transcendent, bearing tn mind that Derrida does not equate Gre with differance and hence not with the quasrtranscendental, Derrida’s question “And what if Gorl were an cficct of the trace?” still rings in my ears. Sec Derrida, VM, 108.

The recent volume God, the Gift, and Postmodernism situates the dehate between Marion and Derrida and the question of negative theology very well. See especially the essay by fohu D. Caputo, “Apostles of the Impossible,” at pp. 185-222 of that collection [herealter Caputo, Af]. M8 Derrida, ViM, 128,

“Derrida, VM, 128. See the discussion by Richard Beardsworth in Dernda and the Pekircal (London: Routledge, 1996), 133ff-

80) RETHINKING GOD AS GIFT so subject to “original contamination by the sign.’’)? Derrida’s criticism is powerful, and Levinas clearly takes it up, because he responds to it by moving from the use of the face as the valve of transcendence to the proximity of Saying. But I am inclined, nevertheless, to want to think further on the phenomenality of the trace and the undecidable possibilities it bears. Marion will seize on this very point: that the invisible somehow manifests itself

in the visible, although it will need to be demonstrated that he takes adequate account of the factor of undecidability, which seems to me to be decisive. With this background in mind, I turn now to examine Marion’s reading of phenomenology.

> Derrida, VM, 129.

Refiguring | Ivenness Giv PHENOMENOLOGY has been broadly characterized as the study

of phenomena as they give themselves to consciousness, but clearly there are many interpretations of what such a study might entail. For Husserl, it seems phenomenology aims to observe what is given in presence Lo consciousness; for Heidegger,

phenomenology has as its object the uncovering of what gives itself in ‘‘presencing”’; for Levinas, phenomenology, in its failure, alerts us to what gives by exceeding conscious thematization. Paying heed to each of these three styles as well as others, Marion develops his phenomenological approach. In doing so, he maintains that what he achieves rests strictly within phenomenological bounds: Marion quite deliberately and strongly indicates his resistance to a theological reading of his later works, Réduction et donation and Etant donné.’ At the same time, however, these works open onto a consideration of revelation as it might be said to enter the phenomenological sphere. The question that is asked of these works is whether that entry is indeed possible. Taken together with his earlier and more explicitly

theological texts, this questioning can be developed further along the lines of whether the entry of revelation can be described as gift, and to what extent it can be specified. This chap-

ter has as its focus the main features of Marion’s initial formulation of a phenomenology of givenness, particularly as it is reliant on or departs from the phenomenologies of Husserl, Heidegger, and Levinas, bit also as It interacts with the work of his contemporaries: Michel Henry, Jean Greisch, and Domintque Janicaud, among others. 1 See the “Réponses préliminaires” in Atant donné, where Marion denies that he is theologically motivated in Réductan et donation, and in the book he is introducing; see also pp. 16-17 n. More strongly, see Derrida and Marion, OTC, 70.

82 REYHINKING GOD AS GIFT REDUCTION ET DONATION: THE RECOVERY OF HUSSERL

In Réduction et donation, Marion offers a careftul—and in many ways,

insightful—reading of Husserl, whose work is frequently eclipsed by that of his most famous student, Heicdegger.? The title of Marions work indicates why Husserl is so important for him: Marion's use of the word donation is an attempt to echo the German Gegebenhet, “givenness,” a phenomenological emphasis that Marion finds in Husserl and which fayors what is given over the consciousness that might be understood to make such giving possible.’ Marion affirms that phenomenology represents a way for philosophy to

proceed after Nietzsche’s radical questioning of metaphysics. Husserl’s project, as Marion understands it, 1s lo examine the pos-

sibility of the unconditional givenness of present objects to consciousness, However, the problem he sees in Husserl’s approach is that the desire for objectivity interferes with the stated goal of “returning to the things themselves, which seems to result in an overemphasis on intuition.? And since Husserl locates donation in the present, it becomes impossible for him to consider the nonpresent.” Marion nonetheless claims that Husserl ultimately values givenness over intuition, that intuition depends on a signification

that precedes it, and that such dependence proves the priority of givenness over objectivity (and, it might be suggested, over presence). In this way, Husserl breaks the bonds of metaphysics, and both Heidegger’s and Derricla’s criticisms of his work are overstated." That signification precedes intuition can be illustrated by ? Jean-Luc Marion, Réduction et donation: Recherches sur Husserl, Heidegger, et la

phénemenotoge (Paris: Presses Universitaires de France, 1989) [hereafter Marion, RED\. This work 1s available in English as Reduction and Groenness: Investigations of Husserl, Heidegger, and Phenomenology, trans. Thomas A. Carlson Cevanston: Northwestern University Press, 1998) [hereafter Marion, AAG], but the translations used are generally my own unless otherwise indicated. 3 Donation can be rendered in English as “donation” as well as “giveniess,” although the translation in RAG uses “givenness,” a use upon which Marion has

insisted. “Donation” keeps open the play between donatian as an act (Ms. A made a donation to Community Aid Abroad) and donation as a fact (there was a donation left at the front doar). [u other words, “donation” retams the possibility of a giver, and the distinction between act and fact is one Marion hunself makes in fe, OTE. * Marion, RED, 7-8, 15; RAG, 1-2, 7. He argues this in detail im chapter 2. *Marion, RED, 89, RAG, 56. *Marion, RED, 28-33; RAG, 15-19.

REFIGURING GIVENNESS 83 two examples: the possibility of phenomenological deception, and the fact that the “T’’ has a meaning even though it cannot be fully intuited.? The second point is crucial for Marion’s rehabilitation of Husserl, and I will explore it in further detail. Marion perceives two weaknesses tn Husserl’s ontology, one of which is that according great privilege to objectivity requires that this objectivity be subordinated to a transcendental! I. Priority is given to consciousness as the realm of “absolute being.’* Yet this

priority ironically enables Marion to argue that the [ actually cludes being.’ Marion insists that the I, which is seen to be phenomenologically constitutive, does not present itself but is only signaled in the phenomenological reduction, and is so excepted both from the realm of ‘‘what is” and from what it “means to be,” although evidently it is not bereft of all meaning. Since the I precedes objectivity, it also precedes the ontology that makes objectivity possible: it “is” an exception to being.'® Marion explains: “The anteriority of the I with regard to every object and of subjectivity with regard to objectivity designates a deviation on this side of ontology: phenomenology occupies this deviation; it

presents itself thus in the strictest sense as the instance of that which has not yet to be in order to exercise itself.”'' Ontology only has a conditional legitimacy: it is subject to the I that makes 7 Marion, RED, 46; RAG, 27-28. * Marion, RED, 233-34; RAG, 156-57.

“This idea in Marion corresponds with Levinas’s location of a “gap” in subyectivity, where the “I? never coincides with itself and cannot recuperate its immemorial origins. Similarly, it can be related to Derrida’s observation that the subject can never be totally self-present. Marion differs from Derrida in his loca-

tion of the | “beyond” being, with a certain Levinasian turn of phrase. In my judgment, Marion’s analysis of subjectivity 1s excellent. ft can be examined in the texts to which T have already referred (Cadava et al., WCAS; Critchley and Dews, DS), as well as in the current context, and in book 5 of ED. Marion, RED, 235: “Si Pune part le Je precede Pobjectité, le monde ct la réalité, side Fautre Vontologic traite exclusivement de Vobjectité des objets, ne doit-on obligatoirement conclure que le Je s'excepte de Pétre ct quune phénoménologie qui le reconnaitrait précéderait toute ontologie? C'est un fait que Husserl a tiré cette conséquence: ‘Aisi en arrive-t-on a [sec] une philosophie premiére qui soit antérieure méme a Vontologie ... et consiste en une analyse de la structure nécessaire dune subjectivite.” " RAG, 157-58. ' Marion, RED, 236: “L’anteriortté du fe sur tout objet et de la subjectivité sur Pobjecuté désigue un écart en deca de Vontologie; la phénomenologie occupe cet écart; elle se présente donc au sens Ie plus stnet comine Vinstance de ce qui na pas encore a étre pour sexercer.” #AG, 158.

84 RETHINKING GOD AS GIFT the reduction, The reduction not only puts in parenthesis ontology as such, but also the whole question of being. Yet the I itself is only attested to in making the reduction, and if the reducing | is excluded from being, where is it located?!” Heidegger would say that Husserl fails because he leaves the being of the I undetermined. Marion suggests instead that “the J, thus the phenomenological reduction with it, zs not.” !’ This would mean that the I “ts”

outside being. In spite of Heidegger's critique, Husserl actually makes a leap outside the horizon of being; in other words, he takes phenomenology further than Heidegger—beyond the question of being: “the uffsmate possibility of phenomenology would not consist more in the question of being than it exhausts itself in the objectivity of the constituted object: beyond the one and also the other, a last possibility could still open up for it—that of posing the I as transcendent to the reduced objecuvity, but also to the being of the being, to place it, by virtue of the reduction taken to its ultimate consequences, outside being.’’'’ Recognizing

that Husserl does not thematize this possibility, Marion argues that his use of the reduction nevertheless pushes us toward it.’ The transcendence of the I signifies in the making of the reduction, but it does not have to be thought according to being. If one of the keys to Réduction et donation ts seen to be the possi-

bility that phenomenology can deliver more than the objects of metaphysics, the other is that this seemingly unlimited potential depends for its success on the extent and rigor of the reduction that is applied. The whole purpose of the book is to attempt to arrive at an unconditional reduction. In the manner already ind1cated, Marion is able to go beyond what he calls the “transcen-

dental” reduction, which is associated with Husserl in the tradition of Descartes and Kant. But Marion is also able to over2 Marion, RED, 236; RAG, 158.

Marion, RED, 240: “le Je, donc la réduction phénoménologique avec hu, n'est pas.” RAG, Lol. 4 Marion, RED, 241: “la possibilité udtvme de la phénoménologie ne consis-

terait pas plus dans la question de l’étre, qu’elle ne s’€puise dans lobjectité de Vobjet coustitué; au-dela de Pune et aussi de l'autre, une derniére possibilité pourrait encore s’ouvrir a elle-—celle de poser le Je comme transcendant a l’objectité récuite, mais encore 4 étre de l'étant, de se poser, en vertu de la réduction conduite 4 ses derniéres conséquences, hors de Vétre.”” RAG 161-62. '’ Marion, RED, 245-46; RAG, 165.

REFIGURING GIVENNESS 85 come what he terms the ‘“existential’’ reduction, evidently linked with Heidegger, and which will now be investigated further. REDUCTION ET DONATION. GOING BEYOND HEIDEGGER WITH LEVINAS

Marion’s reading of Husserl is that the return to the things themselves tends to take us back to the things in their objectivity, when this need not be the case. As we have already begun to see, his reading of Heidegger is that the return takes us back to the things in their being, and similarly he deems this to be an unsatisfactory approach to phenomenology.'* Heidegger's strength, in Marion's judgment, lies in his recognition that being Is given, in one sense according to, but very much in excess of, categorical intuition. Being cannot be intuited in its fullness: the categorical intuition of being remains only as a mark of an anonymous givenness. Yet does phenomenology drive us inevitably and solely to a consideration of being? If there is grvenness that exceeds consciousness, 1s this being giving itself tu thought, or does givenness precede even being?

Marion agrees with Heidegger to the extent that he understands Husserl to have gone beyond his stated phenomenological objective—to return to the things themselves—in focusing on objectivity and givenness in presence.'’ Marion thus agrees that phe-

nomenality need not just be defined in terms of presence: phenomenology ts not simply a means of examining that which ts manifest as present, but also that which is unapparent.’* In fact, '’ Marion, RED, 9, 58-59; RAG, 2-3, 36-37, Marion, RED, 79th; RAG, 4917, '* Marion, RED, 90. Marion does nai quote the German as it relates to presence, only to monstrauion. HT we consider the parts of BT Lo which he is referring

({7), we find that Heidegger is here not considering the question of presence explicitly, but is speaking about manifestation and hiddenness. Given that Heidegger raises the question of being as it shows itself (59), and that he has spoken about the misapprehension of being as “presence” (Anwesenhet), understood according to “‘the Present” (die Gegenwart) (47), 1 seems that these meanings will lie behind Marion's understanding of la présence. Interestmgly enough, Marion insists that in order for the examination to be thoroughly phenomenological, Heidegger will have to arrive at an “intitted presence” of bemg. See RAG, 167.

86 RETHINKING GOD AS GIFT it 18 because phenomena are sometimes not readily given that phenomenology is necessary. Heidegger’s phenomenology of being emerges for this reason: being is no-thing, it is the unapparent, the not-present, the enigmatic, which cannot be approached as some-thing behind other phenomena but which concerns their very phenomenality.'? Yet driven by the concern about whether

or not phenomenology must lead us to being, Marion puts in question the means by which Heidegger arrives at the sense of being. Heidegger adopts a two-phased reduction. The first phase

is the Husserlian one, where the natural attitude is suspended and the phenomenon brought into focus. In the second phase, the initial suspension of the ontological question is then converted into a renewed focus on the sense of being that is given in the reduced phenomenon. But Heidegger’s accomplishment of the second phase is, according to Marion, dependent on at least one of two mechanisms, and this is where he will pressure Heidegger. For Heidegger can only arrive at being either by a consideration of Dasetn, the being that is itself ordered to the uncovering of a sense of being, or by a consideration of being as the nothing, which is achieved in the phenomenological examinations of anxi-

ety and boredom.” If Marion can show that neither of these mechanisms inevitably leads to being, then he will be able to argne that givenness has the priority, even over being. Being will not have the last word. According to Marion's analysis, Heidegger's attempt to arrive at being via Dasein fails for two reasons. The first ts that Heidegger misinterprets the significance of Dasein.*' Uhe second reason is that ontological difference effectively still remains unclarified in Beng and Time. Initially, it appears that Heidegger’s major phenomenological breakthrough is in his thinking of ontological dif-

ference. But as Marton’s analysis unfolds, it becomes evident Marion, RAD, S1.; RAG, 57 ff, “ Marion, RED, 104-18; RAG, 66-76. “' Marion develops this theme in chapter 3 by way of a detailed consideration of Descartes, on whom he is a recognized specialist. See also his “Heidegger and Descartes,” tans. Christopher Macann, in Martin Herdegger: Crarcal Assessments,

ed, Christopher Macann (Loudon: Routledge, 1992), 178-207. “Manon, RED, Lo3ff.; RAG, 108ff. Marion goes on i some detail to show a much higher degree of dependence of Fleideggcr on Husserl in this regard than might first be thought.

REFIGURING GIVENNESS 87 that the sense of ontological difference brought out in Bemg and Time is obscured by other considerations. Bezng and Time 1s not

about acceding to being, but acceding to the sense of being.” Here the interrogation of Dasein represents a phenomenological breakthrough, yet the desired sense of being 1s never really attained. This is because Heidegger cannot arrive at the difference

between the being of the being ancl the sense of being in general." Since the appreach to being by way of Dasein fails in Being and Time, Marion examines a later approach, developed by Heidegger in What Is Metaphysics? Here Heidegger tries to access the phenomenon of being by way of the nothing. Since being can be no thing, no actual being, it may bear a certain similarity to nothing, which is other than an object.*° The nothing is not about a negation of any particular phenomenon, but the negation of the total-

ity of being (léant): not a negative phenomenon, it Is a phenomenon of the negative.’” How is it possible for us to be given the totality of being, in order that it might be negated? Marion observes the distinction between the apprehension of being in its totality and finding oneself at the heart of being 1n its totality. The latter becomes possible according to various alfective tonalities of Dasein, such as ennui (boredom, tedium, annoyance, world-weariness), joy, love and anxicty.** Ennui has the effect of 23 Marion, RED, 194; RAG, 129.

“4 Marion, RED, 196-97, RAG, 131-32. ‘This questrou will become very impor-

tantin chapter 6 of RED because it demands the separation of heing from ats inherence m beings. “6 “What [s Metaphysics: was celivered in 1920 and first publishecl in 1930 by Friedrich Cohen m Bonn. An English wanskition appears in Basic Wntings: Martin Fedegger, 89-110. The epilogue and introduction, added by Heidegger In 1943 and 1949, respectively, da not form part of this version, The epilogue is reproduced as part of the earlier trunslation in Marun Heidegger, Exestence and Beng, trans. ROFL. Half and Alan Crick, 2nd ed. (London: Vision, 1956), 35392. Marion’s reacing of this text is heavily influenced by the epilogue, and Loa certain extent, also by the mtroduction. “Marion, RED, 253, RAG, 170. Wt can appear that the pursuit of the nothing Is a pointless exercise, especially if it is regarded as itsclf a being, or as sumple negation. See the critiques by Carnap and Bergson that Marion repeats at RED, 254-56; RAG, 170-72, ** Marion, RED, 257-58, RAG, 172, “8 Marion, RED, 258; RAG, 173. Marion notes that joy divides itself into joy and love.

88 RETHINKING GOD AS GIFT rendering distinctions between beings unclear. All is confused in a strange indifference: ‘Thus, by the mood of ennuz, Dasein accedes to the totality of being [/¢@ant] as a phenomenon given in person, without reserve or condition; being in its totality gives itself to be seen, precisely because ennui renders indifferent the qualitative and quantitative differences between beings. Dasein thus finds itself thrown as such in the middle of being in its totality.“ Nevertheless, Heidegger clearly has a preference for anxiety over ennui as a more fundamental affective tonality.*’ Like ennui, anxiety leads to a lack of differentiation between beings. But whereas in ennui, Dasein is left lingering in a kind of fog of indifference, in anxiety, being in its totality not only becomes indistinct but also threatening. Dasein is menaced by no particular being, but by beimg as a whole.*) What does the nothing manifest?

In Marion’s opinion it manifests only ambiguity. Since anxiety itself is ambiguous, so is the nothing. It does not secm to manifest the phenomenon of being. The nothing shows itself not as a dis-

unct phenomenon, but on the surface of beings,” It is observed through the double movement of renvoi (sending back) that it provokes, driving Dasemn from the menace of all being and toward

the fact of being in its entirety." At the heart of Marion's analysis is the criticism that just that to which anxicty drives us remains at the mercy of Heidegger's

indecision. For it is not until 1943 that Marion finds it clearly articulated that anxiety drives us to the nothing and thus to “Marion, RED, 260: “‘Ainsi, par la tonalité de Pennw, le Dascin accéde-t-il a

Pétant dans son ensemble comme aun phénoméne donné en personne, sans réserve ni condition; Pétant en totalité se donne a voir, précisément purce que ennui rend indifférentes les diflérences qualitatives et quantitalives entre les étants. Le Dasein se trouve donc bien yeté comme tel au milieu de létant dans son ensemble.” RAG, 174.

“Manon, RED 202; RAG, 175: “au-dela de Vennui, qui montre la totalité de Pétant, Pangoisse dispose a son Rien, L’ennui ne recoit donc qu'un réle provisoire et de transition, sur une route qui méne de l’étant a son Rien par limtermédh-

aire de sa totalisation” (“beyond ennu:, which shows the totality of being, alrxicty opens onto nothingness, fanut thus only receives a provisional and transitional role, on a way which leads from being to its nothing by the intermediary of its totalization’’). I Marion, RD, 265; RAG, 175. *? Marion, RED, 64-65: RAG, 176. % Marion, RED, 265-67; RAG, 177.

REFIGURING GIVENNESS 89 being.*' Marion’s conclusion Is in fact that anxiety does not natu-

rally provide access to the phenomenon of being, and that in order for the nothing to be read as being, an appropriate hermeneutic needs to be uncovered.™ The problem is that anxiety renders all beings indistinct, and that as such it renders beings mute: the nothing simply renders nothing.*" Heidegger's eventual solu-

tion comes in the form of the call of being. Being calls us by its Own power, even in the nothing. This provides the means for interpreting nothing as being, and the attempt to access the phenomenon of being by way of anxiety becomes incidental.*’ It is in Ereignis, the “‘event of Appropriation,” that the call of being is exercised. But such a call can only be given in a response.* Does the interpretation of the nothing as being provide access to the phenomenon of being? There is no imperative that Dasein hear or respond to the call: “If being only renders itself accessible

by the claim which it exercises, if this claim can only demand a response in exposing itself to a deaf denial of gratitude, the ontological hermeneutic of the nothing can fail, since in order to accomplish itself it must be able to fail.“ The ontological hermeneutic of the nothing has to be able to fail. Marion has thus uncovered what he calls a “counter-existential” of Dasezn, which suspends Dasein’s destination toward being: The nothing to which Dasein ultimately accedes cannot lead to being itself, insofar as this Dasein discovers itself there, but not necessarily for and by being, but as, for and by an indistinction more

originary than all ontic indetermination: the indecision before “anticipatory resolution” itself follows from the indecision of being to give itself immediately as a phenomenon. In other words: does the white voice of being’s call, call in the name of being, or, by its 34 Marion, RED, 267-72; RAG, 178-81. 35 Marion, RED, 272: RAG, 181. 35 Marion, RED, 275; RAG, 183.

“7 Marion, RED, 278: “puisque la revendication de Vétre seule fait expérimenter l’étre, Panalytique existentiale de |'angoisse devient désormais au moins insuffisante a mamifester le ‘phénoméne d'étre,’ voire totalement superfétatore.” RAG, 185. “Marion, RED, 270; RAG, 1R6.

“ Marion, RED, 283. “Si Pétre ne se rend accessible que par la revendication qu'il exerce, si cette revendication ne peut demander réponse qu’en s'exposant

aun sourd déni de ‘gratitude,’ hermencutique ontologique du Rien peut échouer, puisque pour s acconiplir elle dott pouvoir échouer.” RAG, 188.

90) RETHINKING GOD AS GIFT indistinct sence, couldn't it let a new abyss appear, anterior, or at least reducible, to being? such a possibility will only find real phenomenological legitimacy if we are able to manifestly produce this counter-existential. We would suggest that it is recognized as enaui: Heidegger had invoked it, cursorily, to render being in its totality accessible, before

resorting to anxicty in order to attain the nothing.

Marion maintains that ennui has the power not only to disengage us from being in its entirety, but also to liberate us from the call by which being makes its claim on us. He describes this powerful

enn? as a fundamental human condition. It is akin to an overwhelming realization of facticity, and it marks a difference from self, or a disgust with all that would normally be desired. It is neither nihilistic nor a negation.” Ennut dissolves all passion. In the state of ennut, | desert not only the world, but myself" Contrary to what Heidegger intended, en#uz suspends the claim of being on Dasein. How? For ennui to suspend the call of being would imply both that being could be given phenomenologically, and that Dasem could be affected not only ontically by ennui, but ontologically. Now, being is given in two ways: in the call of being that takes place in Lreignis, and as that which makes us wonder.

Ennui tunciuons by making Dasetz deaf to the call and blind to wonder. In other words, ennui can render Dasein mauthentic, leading it to the possibility of not heeding its destiny in being. " Manion, &D, 283. “le Rien auguel accéde ulumement le Dasern peut ne pas

le condurre a Vétre méme, en sorte que ce Dasein se découvre la, mais non nécessairement pour et par Pétre, mais comme pour et par une midistinction plus originaire que toute indétermination onuque: Vindécision deyart la ‘résolulion anticipatrice’ découle ellc-méme de Pindeécision de PCtre a se donner immediatement dans un phénomeéne. Autrement formulé: la voix blanche dont Pétre revendique revendique-telle au nom de l’étre, ou, par san indistinct si-

lence, ne pourrait-elle pas laisser paraitre un nouvel abime, antérieur, ou du moins irréductible, a Vétrer “Une telle posstbilité ne trouvera Cauthentuque légitunié phénomeéuologique que st nous pouvons prodiure manifestement ce contre-existential. Nous sugg¢rons de le reconnaitre comme l’ennut: Heidegger avait invoqué, cursive-

ment, pour rendre accessible Fétant dans son ensemble, avant de recourir a Pangoisse pour atteindre le Rien.” RAG, [88. Manon, ALD 284-86, HAG, 189-91. * Marion, Riki, 287-88; RAG, 191-92. Marion passes here from Deasern to | without conunent. “Manion, RED, 289-92; RAG, 192-95.

REFIGURING GIVENNESS 9] Is there a possibility that the suspension of the call of betng by ennui might leave us open to hearing a different call, a call prior to that of being? Marion mentions as examples the Christian call “from the Father,’ quoting Heidegger, and the call that comes to us in the face of the Other, as Levinas describes it.!! Enaw: would

operate phenomenologically as a reduction, not to bemngs, or being, but to the call. “After the transcendental reduction and the existential reduction, occurs the reduction to and from the call. That which gives itself only gives itself to the one who devotes

him- or herself to the call and only under the pure form of a confirmation of the call, repeated because received." Such a call would precede being. But it would also precede Dasem, and even the I. Drawing heavily on Levinas, Marion speaks of the call that is made to me, and to which I respond “Here Lam” (ime vote)" Marion names the one who is called “the interlocuted.”* As the interlocuted, I have no power of selfdeterminauon. The what or the who that summons me bears an alterity that 1s prior to my intentionality, prior to my subjectivity, and prior to the ego."* I

cannot anticipate or comprehend the call. It strikes me by surprise, escaping the closed circle of my being." Yet while that which calls me renders me destitute, it does not annihilate me, There is still a me who is there to respond. The call seems to expose me to the necessity of making a judgment about it. Before any other question, the call renders it essential that I decide about

the claim that is made on me. “It 1s necessary to respond to a question of fact: What claim originarily surprises it? The fact of 4 Marion, RED, 294-95; RAG, 196-97 * Marion, AED, 296: “Aprés la réducuon Wanscendantale et la réducuion exis-

lentiale, intervicnt Ja réduction a et de Vappel. Ce qui se donne ne se donne qu’a celtu qui s'adonne a Vappel et que sous la forme pure d'une confirmation ce Pappel, répété parce que requ.” RAG, 197-98. * Marion also notes that this possibility can be observed in Heidegger, where the “there” of Daseen (being there’) precedes its being. Marion, RED, 299; RAG, 200.

“Marion, RED, 300; RAG, 200. * Marion, RED, 300; RAG, 200-201. ™ Marion, RED, 300-301; RAG, 201-2. This is reminiscent of Derrida’s descripuion of the secret that “makes us emble,” in The Gift of Death, trans, David Wills (Chicago: Uiuversity of Chicago Press, 1995), 53-55 [herealter Derrida, GD]. It

is to be noted that by escaping being this alterity also escapes presence, so that Marion's rehabilitation and development of Husserl is compilcte.

92 RETHINKING GOD AS GIFT that claim, in the paradoxical manner of an a priori that is essentially after the fact, decides the horizon where any theory of the interloqué will become legitimately thinkable. A facticity therefore precedes the theory, but it is no longer a matter of my facticity as Dasewn, itis a matter of the absolutely other and antecedent facticity of the claim convoking me by surprise."*” To this question of who or what 1t 15 that summons, Marion answers undecidably. We

cannot with certainty name the caller, and that is as it must be. It

becomes a question of recognizing that there is a claim being made upon me and of risking a response.” Contrary to Heidegger, Marion argues that the phenomenon of being is not given according to the phenomenon of the nothing, but according to being’s own call. And yet the call of being can itself be suspended by ennui. So Marion claims that there is the potential for an undecidable call to precede being. Whether or not this prior call can itself be suspended, he does not contemplate. What 1s crucial is how the phenomenological method has been harnessed to arrive at a more radical givenness than that of being. The more strict the reduction that is employed, the better we are able to observe what is given. What is reduced also becomes the measure of the one who so reduces. So he is able to arrive at his three reductions: the transcendental reduction, the existential reduction, and the reduction to the call, which can be analyzed in terms of four questions: to whom is what given, according to which horizon, and what is thereby excluded? The transcenden-

tal reduction, placed in the framework of these questions, concerns how an intentional and constitutive I is given constituted objects, according to a regional ontology that has as its horizon objectivity, and excludes that which cannot be reduced to this objectivity. The existential reduction concerns how Dasein (un-

derstood in terms of being-in-the-world, and brought before being in its entirety by anxiety) appears to be given different man© Marion, RED, 301: “Tl faut répondre a une question de fail: quelle revendll-

cation le surprend originairement? Le fait de cette revendication décicle, a la maniére paradoxale d'un @ pron essentiellement aprés coup, de Uhorizon ott toute théorie de linterlogué deviendra légitimement pensable. Une facticité précéde donc la théoric, mais il ne s’agit plus de la facticité micnne du Dasein; il s'agit de la facticité absolument autre et antécédente de la revendication me convoquant par surprise.” Translation taken from RAG, 202. "| Marion, RED, 302; RAG, 202.

REFIGURING GIVENNESS 93 ners of being, ontological difference, and the phenomenon of being, according to the horizon of time, and excludes that which does not “have to Be.” The reduction to the call concerns how the interlocuted (the me, prior to the I or to Dasein) is given the gift of surrendering to or withdrawing from the claim of the call,

according to no other horizon than that of the call itself, and excludes nothing, since it is transcendental.” In Réduction et donation, Marion seeks to push the boundaries of phenomenology in order to allow for the possibility that being might give not only itself, but also that which “is not” according to the horizon of being. Marion’s argument has three essential aspects. First is his belief that being can be exceeded: with the example of the I he indicates an exception to being, and with the example of ennui he indicates an exception to the call of being. Second is his emphasis on the quality of the reduction: a complete reduction (one that goes further than to what “is” and even beyond sheer “‘isness” itself) will yield the givenness of whatever inclines to give itself, beyond the control and initiative of a constituting subject. Finally, there is his pointing to a new horizon, the horizon of the call itself, the meaning of which will in due course

be further vestigated. A CRITICAL ENGAGEMENT WITH REDUCTION ET DONATION

Having outlined Marion’s position as regards Husserl, Heidegger, and, to some extent, Levinas, as it is argued in Réduction et donation, several questions arise, It is important to address them prior to considering Ltant donné, for it is only mn the light of these ques-

tions that the nature of his responses in that work will become clear. These questions cluster around three poles, although they Invariably overlap: the phenomenological, the metaphysical, and the theological. 50, to what extent has Marion operated within the limits of that discipline known as phenomenology? Has Marion gone beyond metaphysical language and concepts, or has he simply reinscribed them at a higher level? And what are the theological implications of Marion’s phenomenology? * Marion, RED, 302-5; RAG, 203-5.

94 RETHINKING GOD AS GIFT the Reduction to Gtvenness and the Limits of Phenomenology

In an article contributed to a special edition of the Revue de Métaphysique et de Morale dedicated to Réduction et donation, Michel Henry makes the point that of four possible founding principles

of phenomenology, the reduction to givenness is the only one that can achieve an appropriate phenomenological end.®* For Henry, that end is the experience of life, and the means to that end is not the exposition of being or beings but of the “how” of phenomenality, the mode of givenness of phenomena.*! The reduction to donation its the most radical reduction because it allows us to arrive at (without our comprehending it) what gives us to ourselves: auto-affection, or “Arch-Revelation.” The focus of phenomenology is therefore not on that which can be made present in representation (that which “appears’’), but on that which exceeds representation in its “appearing,” which is invisible. While this article is a response to Marion’s work and has its own particular emphases (the call is always determined as the “call of Life”; there is no possibility of response; the call is immanent), we can see why Marion names Henry as one of his greatest influences.” Marion aud Henry belong to those who are promot-

ing the renewal of phenomenology. But is this phenomenology phenomenological m the tradition of Husserl? Is the reduction to givenness, which 1s frequently a reduction to what “is not” or

“is not seen,” legitimately phenomenological? This question arises as an issue not only in the context of Réduction et donation

but in the broader context of phenomenological studies in contemporary France, and it has a number of aspects. In the previous chapters, phenomenology was described as the study of what gives itself to consciousness and how it 1s given. It quickly became clear that according to the way Husserl developed his science, givenness was dependent on the presence of the given object to consciousness. Marion underlines this condition when 8 Michel Henry. “Ouatre principes de la phéenomeénologie,” Reve de Métaphysrque ef de Morale 96, no. 1 (1991): 3-26, 21-25 [hereafter Henry, QPP. “! This thesis is developed as Henry's “phénonénologie matérielle,”” and an

extended treatment of it can be found im his work of the same name (Parts: Presses Universitaires de France, 1990); see also his @ essence de fa manifestation (Paris: Presses Universitaires de France, 1963). Flenry, OPP, 24. Marion made thes clisclosure m personal conversation.

REFIGURING GIVENNESS 95 he observes, in relation to Heidegger and the “phenomenon of being”: “In strict phenomenology, the ultimate instance of decision remains ‘the principle of principles,’ namely the givenness that is justified unconditionally by intuited presence; it 1s before this latter instance that it might be decided whether a ‘phenomenon of Being’ eventually gives itself’? In Marion’s analysis, and as we have scen, Heidegger’s attempt to deliver being in this way fails, particularly because the call that is to deliver it is and must be of undecidable origin. This is similar to the way in which Levinas, by exceeding being, cannot deliver an individual, concrete

Other, and cannot deliver a God who can be known in the Inftnite, but only guessed at. And it is precisely because of issues such

as these—although my examples lie at one end of the continuum—that Derrida is able to suggest the failure of phenomenology as such. Phenomenology fails to deliver a “phenomenon” that can be any more than a representauon—that Is to say, any more than an interpretation. Phenomenology is a hermeneutics. Yet in Réduction et donation, Marion both repeats the failure of phenomenology by delivering a call that is “otherwise than being,” and infinitely interpretable, and asserts that this delivery remains within the tradition of Husserlian phenomenology. In other words, the great achievements of Réduction et donation are cast in phenomenological terms, when it seems they may belong beyond phenomenology completely. Now, the question Is perhaps

only a technical one, but it has important wnplications, For i, as Marion seems to be suggesting, we can describe as a (given) phenomenon that which nevertheless cannot be grasped by int ition, he is attempting to maintain a privileged position tor phenomenology prior to hermeneutics. If, on the other hand, he has gone beyond the limits of phenomenology, then what gives itself otherwise remains an mterruption to, rather than a legitimate object of, the Husserlian science.

It is relevant to note at this pomt the particular way in which Marion understands “presence.” Early on in Réduction et donatzan

he debates Derrida’s reading of Husserl along the lines that “presence” does not mean “able to be grasped by intuition,’ but “given.” Therefore, according to his definition, there can “be” °* Marion, RED, 250; translation from RAG, 167. ? Marion, RED, 56-57. RAG, 34-35.

96 RETHINKING GOD AS GIFT such a thing as a “present phenomenon”’ that signifies without fulfillment. Exciting as the potential of this definition might be, there is a problem here that refuses to go away. For the signification that is not fulfilled will always and necessarily be left open. It therefore cannot be described as such; not yet any “thing,” it defies the capacity of the phenomenologist to go any further than signaling its “presence,” which for Marion is in the mode of excess. The difficulty is exemplified in the passage quoted above with regard to Heidegger and being as a phenomenon. Marion tells us that “it is before the latter instance |[1.e., “the givenness that is justified unconditionally by antuited presence’ | that it might be decided whether a ‘phenomenon of being’ eventually gives itself’ (emphasis added). In other words, in order to determine whether or not being gives itself, its givenness has to be not only present but mtuited as such—that is, its meaning as being must be determinable. Yet if 1t exceeds intuition, how are we to determine that it is being? Heidegger suggests that this determination occurs by means of the call. But as Marion points out, with great insight, the call that is to lead us to being has itself no determinate meaning. We have indeed reached the limits of phenomenology. This leads us to contemplate Marion's use of the word “horizon.” In Réduction et donation, Marion speaks of a new “phenome-

nological horizon not determined by being,” and the “horizon of the call.’’>* Now, a horizon is a type of border, or limit. Husseri

speaks of the horizon as the background from which things are extracted as particular objects of consciousness.™ Expressing this im more Kantian terms, a horizon would be a condition of possi-

bility for knowing anything at all, since the horizon forms the frame for knowledge of individual things. And thinking of hortzon as context leads us to Heidegger’s usage, where it is less a question of the horizon being something that moves, expands, or changes (in a factical or existentiell sense) than something that ts the always and already given existential limit within which Dasein

works.’ Such a contextual or horizonal limit can be observed in his discussion of ‘‘being-in-the-world,” for example." In each of 34 Marion, RED, 241, 305; RAG, 161, 204.

* See Husserl, /7, for example at §27 ® See the note by Heidegger's translators in B74, 1. “ Heidegger, BY, 33.

REFIGURING GIVENNESS 97 these cases, the horizon is a border that includes or allows for particular possibilities, which fences an economy of thought and action. Yet it seems to me that Marion is seeking to take us beyond the limits of the economies of objectivity, of being, of metaphysics, and of intuition. What he seeks is a completely unlimited hort

zon.” What he seeks, in fact, is an appearing that does not have any horizon against which it can be measured. The question is, can anything appear without “appearing as something’: Expanding the Resonances of Gegebenheit

We turn briefly to observe a problem that arose in discussion after

the release of Réduction ef donation and has continued to be a problem even after Etant donné. This relates to Marion’s use of Gegebenheit. Joseph S. O'Leary questions whether or not Marion ts

justified in translating it as donation. “He .. . reduces the plural and diverse terminology of ‘givenness’ In Husseri and others to a single somewhat grandiose notion of ‘donation.’ All this facili-

tates the entry of the biblical God into phenomenology, as the one who grants being.’ Evidently, since Marion comes to insist on “‘givenness” rather than “donation” in English, the problem is somewhat eased. However, O'Leary's comment cpens onto two further difficulties. The first of these concerns the extent to which Marion is preparing a theological end for his phenomenology, and since this will be discussed at length, I do no more than raise it here. The second difficulty concerns the extent to which Marion is justified in linking Husserl and Heidegger in the way

he does through a reading of Gegebenheit. In the words of one questioner (who remains anonymous) in the Revue: “If tt is legitimate to distinguish and to oppose in a common phenomenological horizon the transcendental reduction of Husserl from and to the

reduction to the ‘phenomenon of being’ of Heidegger, the passage to the third reduction—in the way that you propose it—

remains more problematic, save that you play with a certain equivocity in the very term ‘donation,’ the same one that drives ® Marion, RED, 305; RAG, 204. “O'Leary, RPCT, 191.

* Although John D. Caputo notes the difficulties this creates; AJ, 221 n. 23.

98 RETHINKING GOD AS GIFT lus] from the Selbs(eegebenhert to the constellation of the Geben, of

the Gabe and of the es gzbt."° Marion’s response in this setting is strong: both Husserl and Heidegger foster and maintain the ambiguity of givenness and the terms that can be semantically

associated with it. His reading therefore rests not only on an equivocal reading of their works, but on the very equivocity he finds there,” Renewing the Metaphysical; Presupposing the Theological: Laruelle

Another of the difficuluies associated with Réduction et donation 1s

described by Francois Laruelle."? Laruelle’s general criticism of Marion is that in this work he simply stays within the bounds of “philosophy.” but more specifically, he argues that Marion uses phenomenology-as-philosophy to assert’ parucularly Christian ends. For “philosophy” we can read “metaphysics,” and so Laruelle is suggesting that Marion remains trapped within onto-theology:

J-L. M does not want to abandon philosophy—his Greck element——but only to be torn from it by a Call—by God rather than by another thought than the philosophical. He wants to be Chrislian from the point of view of the real, and philosophy—yct a last ume, but it is definitive or un-exceedable—from the point of view of thought: he wants to continue to reduce and describe. He makes of philosophy a last negative-condition—ot the Christian, his own inantcr of going beyond the onto-theological method of metaphysics; he chains humanity to God and God to philosophy in place of chaining humanity to itself and of leaving philosophy to its nonhuman destiny. Either it is a philosophy that makes e extremzs the leap (of) the Call—but we scarcely believe it—; or it is a Christian

who 1s condemned to do (in spite of himself) philosophy from which he asks that one tears him without making him leave it. " Question one to Jean-Luc Marion, in “Réponses a quelques questions,” Revue de Métaphysique ef de Morale 96, no. 1 (1991): 65-76, 65 [hereafter Marion, ROG.

Marion, AQQ, 68-69. Francois Laruelle, “L’Appel et le Phénomeéne,” Revue de Métaphysique et de Morale 96, no. 1 (1991): 27-41 [hereafter Laruelle, AP]. ™ Laruelle, AP, 37-38: “J.-L. M. ne veut pas abandonner Ta philosophie—son

élément grec—inais seulement en étre arraché dun Appel—par Dieu plutot que par une pensée autre que la philosophique. I veut étre chrétien du point

REFIGURING GIVENNESS 99 Laruelle explains that from the very beginning, Marion sets up his project in terms of its legitimate continuation of the philosophical tradition, taking on the very telos of that tradition, which is to uncover the self-givenness of things.” He maintains that Mar-

ion’s work is driven by the hermeneutic of “the Call”: his phe-

nomenology is only intelligible in terms of the call, but the decision to employ this hermeneutic already betrays his own Christian interests and exposes Marion's philosophical presuppositions.”” Further, Marion’s use of phenomenology as “the philosophy of our time” illustrates his quite traditional “philosophical faith. 7! According to Laruelle, Marion makes two highly significant de-

cisions: to emphasize donation as absolute, and to identify reception with donation, manifestation with the given, phenomenology with ontology.” Laruelle asserts that Marion’s identification of each of the dialectical poles in these pairs enables him to resolve them in favor of a higher principle; once again, we are referred to the call.” However, this means that the call always remains relalive to something else: “still, a condition remains for the Unconditioned,”"* Marton conditions his method with the philosophical decision to make the call a transcendent term that tears us from

the empirical. In so doing, Marion separates himself from the position of Henry (which Laruelle reads as radical immanence without transcendence), as well as from Levinas (which Laruelle reads as transcendence without the problem of the immanence of de vue du réel, et philosophie—encore une derniére fois, mais elle est détinitive ou indépassable—du poimt de vue de la penséc: il veut continuer a reduire et décrire. 1] fait du philosophe unc derniére condition-négative—du chrétien, sa mamiére a lui de dépasser la structure onto-théologique de la métaphysique; i! enchaine homme a Dieu et Dicu ala philosophie au lieu @’ enchainer l'homme a lui-méme et de laisser la philosophe a son destin non-humain, Ou bien c’est un philosophie qui fait i exfremzs le saut (de} fAppe!—mais nous ne le croyons

suerc—; ou bien c'est un chrépen qui est condammé a faire malgré lui de la philosophie 4 laquelle Hl demande qu’on Varrache sans la lui faire quitter.”

" Laruclle, A 2B. Larnelle, AP 29, 34-35. Of note here is that Laruelle uses “l’Appel” where Marion uses “‘’appel.” 1 will use the lowercase except in quotations, To what extent is Laruelle’s cricism couched in terms of what he wants to find? 7 Laruelle, AP 24. “ Laruelle, AP 30-31.

Laruelle, AP 31-33. Taruelle, AP’, 33: “toutelos, une condition subsiste pour Pinconditionné.”

100 RETHINKING GOD AS GIFT reception). For Laruelle, Marion's retaining of a dyadic structure marks his dependence on “philosophy.” This cannot but condition the way Marion deals with the call itself.” In Laruelle’s judg-

ment, the ultimate possibility for phenomenology has been posited as a reality prior to the phenomenological investigation, and on the basis of revelation. It has been made absolute.” ‘'The Call is the Christian kernel which will order this [the reduction}, the real heart of all relief and of all reduction—thus the pure form of the relief.””> However, the call falls outside phenomenality. Further, since the call rests on a philosophical decision, there is no guarantee that it escapes the fold to which phenomena are subjected: in other words, the call cannot be identified without being subject to undecidability, and need not be ultimate.”* Marion’s phenomenology fails, and for much the same reason that (according to Laruelle) all philosophy must fail, and is in need of deconstruction.*’ “The éeles of phenomenology is always betrayed:

because it is precisely only a teles and because to philosophize is to betray the reality of the One.”™!

To what extent are Laruelle’s criticisms valid? He is not alone *’ Laruelle, AP, 34: ‘Mais elle ne le fait qu’en témoignant d'une volonté de conserver jusqu'au bout la matrice la plus fondamentale de la philosophie— celle de la Dyade, du Pli ou du Doublet—alors que tout Pintérét des solutions ‘Levinas’ et ‘Henry’ avait été de la liquider ct de venir—chaque fois sur un mode trés différent—a une penséc réellement sunple ou sans pli.” (“Bue it only witnesses to a will to conserve to the end the most funcamental matrix of philosophy—that of the Dyad, of the Fold or of the Denthlet—whereas all the interest of the Levinastan or Henrian solutions had been to liquidate it and to come— each time m a very different mode—to a thought really simple or without fold.’’) * Laruelle, AP 34-35: “On verra dailleurs plus tard que la philosophie et ses

décisions continuent a conditionner de mani¢re extémcure Appel lui-méme, parce gue [Appel est seulement un azrechement a la philosophie, a ses formes ‘restremtes) (ontico-ontologiques} plutét qu'un suspens radical de toute philosophie possible; et que Vennutne va pas jusqu’a la véritable idifférence, qu'il n'a pas encore la plus grande force récdhuctnice possible.” * Laruelle, AP 35. * Larudelle, AP, 36: ‘Appel est le noyau chrétuen qui commandera celle-ci [la

réduction], le coeur réel de toute rcléve et de toute réduction—donc la forme prere de la reléve.” * Laruelle, AP, 38. *) Laruclle, AP 36.

"! Laruelle, AP, 37: “Le felos de la phénoménologie est toujours trahi: parce que ce n’est justement qu'un fe/os et parce que philosopher est trahir le réel de Pun.”

REFIGURING GIVENNESS 101 in ascribing to Marion a theological motive for developing a phenomenology of givenness, and for that reason I will address other

aspects of his critique before returning to the theological one. Does Marion remain trapped within the bounds of metaphysics? As it was observed above, Marion’s horizonal language opens him up to the criticism of his thinking metaphysically, and Laruelle’s reading of a dyadic structure supports this criticism. At the same time, however, if we read Marion in line with his Levimasian background, and take seriously his attempts not to identify a “Caller”

with any certainty, then he is transgressing metaphysics, if not escaping it (which would in any case be impossible, as Derrida has shown). It is hard to see how Laruelle can justify his distinction between Marion and Levinas on the grounds that the reception of the call somehow destroys its alterity, while the welcoming of the Other does not, unless in éefh instances there is a slippage

from transcendental to transcendent that enables identinication. And Marion’s addressing of the question of subjectivity, under the figure of the interlocuted, suggests that he is well aware of the metaphysical traps that await in his analysis, and able to deal with them. To further establish Marion’s “post’’-mctaphysical credentials we would need only to look at his previous works. But to do this would leave us in something of a bind. For it is undoubtedly in the light of Marion’s previous works that Laruelle is able to make the charge that Marion is theologically (and therefore, in his mind, metaphysically) motivated. In God Without Being and L idole et la distance we find plenty of material to support Marion's

transgressing of metaphysics, but we also find much that would sustain Laruelle’s opinion that Marion keeps both the philosophical and the Christian faith. The question is, to what extent does that enable us to criticize his phenomenology in Réduction et donatron

Does Marion arbitrarily choose the call as a means of guiding

his phenomenology (and does he make it absolute)? The response might be yes to both parts of the question, tf we are to assume that Marion has a Christian project in mind. But we might also interpret Marion far less suspiciously if we remember that he

is not the first person to use the device of the call. The call of being Is an increasingly persistent theme in Heidegger, and the summons from the Other (equally the call to responsibility, or

102 RETHINKING GOD AS GIFT the election by the Other) is a constant refrain in Levinas. If all Marion is doing is trying to allow for a valve in the economy of being or of beings, then the call can function in this way without necessarily pointing to a transcendent God. fenicaud, Derrida, and Le tournant théologique However, 1n spite of Marion’s later avowal that Réduction et dona-

on is a phenomenological, not a theological, work, criticisms of his work relating to its theological presuppositions continue to be made on various grounds. Perhaps that is because, as we have seen and will see further, the work of an author rarely stands on its own, and many of Marion's phenomenological insights have been expressed in a theological context. But it is also because Marion’s work is but one of a number of works that emerge from a particular climate in French philosophy. The theological criticism is thus directed not only toward Marion, but also to a whole “school,” if they might be so brought together. In 1991, Dominique Janicaud published a slin volume titled Le fournant théologique de la phénoménologie francaise, where he argues that recent French

phenomenology has departed from the Husserlian emphasis on immanence, in favor of the study of the breaking up of immanence by transcendence. “Is this trait [of French phenomenology] the rupture with immanent phenomenality? The opening onto the invisible, to the Other, to a pure givenness or to an ‘archrevelation’? To this question Janicaud responds with a resound-

ing yes. Further, he argues that such openings are inherently theological ones. Tracing the genealogy of this trait, the origins of which seem to lie in Heidegger's phenomenology of the inapparent, Janicaud identifies its emergence most strongly in writers such as Levinas, Marion, Henry, and Jean-Louis Chrétien (we might also add later works by Jean-Yves Lacoste and Louis-Marie

Chauvet to the list), The analysis he then pursues relies on an “™ Dominique Janicaud, Le fournant tealupique de fa phénomeénaloge francaise

(Combas: Editions de l'éclat, 1991), 8 [herealter Jantcaud, 77PF]; all wanslations of Janicaud used here are mine. The text is now available in translation in Dominique Janicaud, Jean-Francois Courtine, Jean-Louis Chrenen, Michel Henry, Jean-Luc Marion, and Paul Ricoeur, Phenemenology and the “Theological Tian’: The French Debate (New York: Fordham University Press, 2000), 1-103.

REFIGURING GIVENNESS 103 argument that these writers have pursued a methodological trans-

gression of Husserlian phenomenology. That transgression relates to the disruption of the noetic-noematic correlation as well as to what fanicaud maintains is the essential neutrality (or atheism) of Husserl’s method.*’ To remain faithful to phenomenology

requires a faithfulness to Husserl's scientific approach, which means that it is illegitimate to ask questions about that which exceeds consciousness and, indeed, clearly partisan to do so. Chapter 3 of Le tournantis devoted to a discussion of Marion in response to Réduction el donation. Recognizing that the latter work

is ‘more discreet” in its theological interests than earlier works of Marion, Janicaud nevertheless makes the claim that Marion's work is ideologically driven." Janicaud begms by observing that the question has to do with “the status of phenomenology (and of the phenomenological) between a ‘surpassed’ (or challenged) metaphysics and a possible theology (al once prepared and retained).”*> Marion asserts that phenomenology is the legitimate successor of philosophy-as-metaphysics; Janicaud, on the other hand, questions whether or not this is or need be the case. Why, he asks, has “the thesis of ‘the metaphysical extraterritoriality of phenomenology’ and that which it allows or authorizes been pushed so far’’?*° Janicaud argues that phenomenology is inherently metaphysical, a criticism Marion addresses carefully and well in his article “Metaphysics and Phenomenology: A Relief for Theology.”"*? But Janicaud further sees no necessary connection be-

tween the three reductions that Marton proposes, insisting that Marion's hermeneutic depends on a misreading of Husserl and Heidegger, along the lines of Levinas.** He asks: ““What remains

of phenomenology in a reduction that ‘properly speaking is not?” ™ Marion's reduction to the call, Janicaud maintains, sets us "3 See, lor example, Janicaud’s discussion of Levinas at 7TPF, 35-36. Tanicaud, PPPF, Slit. * Janicaud, PLPF, 40. “© Janicaud, 27PPF, 41,

** Jean-Luc Marion, “Metaphysics and Phenomenology: A Relef for Theol ogy, trans. Thomas A. Carlson, Crtical Inquiry 20 (1993-94): 573-91, This article originally appeared in French as “Métaphysigue et phénoménologie: Une réléve pour la theologie,” Bulletin de Liltérature Eeclésrastique 94, no. 3 (1993); 189-206.

* Janicaud, 77PE 43-48. Janicaud, 1TPF, 48.

104 RETHINKING GOD AS GIFT up for a theological response to the question of the call’s origin. The confusion and surprise of the interlocuted that Marion describes, the phenomenological “emptiness” or gap, or negative phenomenology upon which Marion insists—these are simply parts of his structuring a philosophical system toward religious ends, a sucturing Caputo will later describe as “a smuggling of the invisible into the visible.” This reading of Marion is reinforced with a reference to another of his works—this time on Descartes—where philosophy is made destitute by theology (Descartes’s thought is transgressed by that of Pascal)."" It is also supported with a refcrence to Marion’s response to questions put to hin mn the Revue, where Marion himsclf draws a thread between his earlier, theological works and what he achieves in Réduction et

donation.” Janicaud concludes, therefore, that “his phenomenological gap is only explained by a double reference that each forewarned reader is aware of: the problematic of the overcoming of ontology (or of metaphysics), the properly theological or spiritual dimension. It is the overlapping of the two schemes under the cover of phenomenology that is here contested.”"* Along with Jean-Louts Chrétuten, Janicaud deems Marton guilty of abandoning phenomenological neutrality.” [t is interesting to observe that Janicaud’s critique corresponds In some ways to that of Derrida, although for entirely different reasons. The basic thrust of Derrida’s criticism of Marion is that while Marion attempts to suspend the horizon by suggesting that the origin of the call cannot be ultimately determined, he does tend toward idcnufying the caller as the Christian God: To limit ourselves here to the most basic schema, let us say that the question, if not the discussion, would remain open at the point of

the determination of the call or of the demand, there where the - Janicaud, TIPE 48-49; Caputo, A/, 208. See also the discussion by Eric Albez in De Conpossibidité dela phénoménolome: Sur la philosophue francaise contemporaine

(Paris: Vrin, 1995), 604. “' See Jean-Luc Marton, Sur le prsme méaphysique de Descartes (Pars: Presses Universitaires de France, 1986); On Descartes’ Metaphysical Prism, trans. Jeffrey L. Kosky (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1999). ™ Marion, RQQ, 66-68. Janicaud, TEPE, 51. “ Janicaud, T71F, 53. For a response to Janicaud, see Jacques Colette, “Phénoménologie et métaphysique,” Cntique 548-49 (January-February 1993): 56-73.

REFIGURING GIVENNESS 105 circle seems to turn between the call of Being (Anspruch des Seis), the call of the father (Anspruch des Vaters), the primacy of which Heidegger contests, and a ‘‘call which is brother to the one Hetdegger dismisses,” namely, the one that ‘Levinas will not fail to take up.” Nor, I will add, does Marion, who seems lo me also to make ‘‘the call as such,” ‘the pure form of the call,” conform to the call of the father, to the call that returns to the father and that, in truth,

would speak the truth of the father, even the name of the father, and finally of the father inasmuch as he gives the name.

A little further on he continues: Having declared that. it excludes any determinable content, why does

Marion determine “the pure form of the call” (and therefore of the gift) as call ‘in the name of the Father’’? As unique call, despite

“the gap between the two calls (the one Christian, the other Jewish)” that it is “important to maintain’’? [s it possible to hear a “pure form of the call” (and first of all must one presume such a purity? And if one does, on what basis?) that would still not be from

Being, nor from the father, nor in the fraternal difference of the “there,” if one can put it that way, between the Jew and the Christian, nor therefore in the language of the “Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God is one Lord” (Deuteronomy 6:4) in which, Marion tells

us, they “both have their source” (p. 205) °°

Derrida’s reading of Marion uncovers what we might, borrowing from Caputo, describe as “the dream of pure presence without différance.”° It is a dream characterized by a fear of dissemination, or expressed more positively, by a longing for an origin (for “the

return to the father’), a longing for purity (for “the pure form of the call’), and a longing for unity (for “the call as such’’).% Nevertheless, whether or not this reading is a fair one, given the limits of the passage on which it relies, is a legitimate question. It has already been pointed out that Marion now sees Réduction et donation as a strictly phenomenological work, without an overt or covert theological agenda. But there is no doubt that the phe-

nomenology he puts in place has possible openings onto theology, most specifically at the point of the call. The arguments % Derrida, G7/, 52 n. % John TD. Caputo, The Prayers and Tears of Jacques Dernda: Religron without Rebt-

gion (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1997), 20 [hereafter Caputo, PTID. “ Emphasis added.

106 RETHINKING GOD AS GIFT outlined ahove come down to the following: first, to the extent that Marion’s work is not phenomenological, it 1s theological Qjanicaud);: and second, to the extent that itis phenomenological, it is onto-theological (Laruelle, Derrida}. Why do these positions

turn around the theological outcomes, which Marion is later so anxious to avoid? Perhaps it is ume, in the light of what Marion writes in the preface to Réduction et donation (*|these investigations} maintain an indirect, but no doubt necessary tle with older works that, without knowing it, presupposed them’’), to examine the theological trajectory in which Réduction et donation can be situated." The judgment that Marion has in mind a transcendent Caller in Réduction et donation is quite probably made on the basis of works such as God Without Being and L ‘idole et la distance. There are

a number of passages to which we can refer. In God Without Being, for example, we read: The ontic difference between being and nonbeinyg admits no appeal; m the world, it acts irrevocably, without appeal. From elsewhere than m the world, then, God himself lodges an appeal. He appeals to his own indiflerence against the difference between being and nonbeing. He appeals to his own call. And his call sets this indifference into play so that the call not only calls nonbeings

to become beings... but he calls the nonbeings as if they were beings.”

Or again: The decision of beingness depends neither on the categories of a philosophical discourse nor on Being deploying itself in ontological difference, but on instances separated by the limit between “the world” and the “call” of the God who gives lite. And cunously, for an informed reading at least, the nonbeingness of that which nevertheless is results from the “world,” whereas God outsite-theworld prompts the beingness of nonbeings.!™

Marion speaks of “two sources of glory and of glorification: the funding of the ‘world’ or the call of Christ."""' Further, he goes % Marion, RAG, xi. % Manion, GWB, 87-88. MM Marion, GWB, 93.

i Marion, GWB, 94.

RFEFIGURING GIVENNESS 107 on to identify the call as the gift: “And from now on one can delimit even more closely the game that, indifferent to ontological difference, thus causes beings to elude being: it is called the sift. The gift that gave rise to the operations of preceding readings—call, give life. as if, father, and so on—gives Being /be-

ings." This understanding of call at least partially develops what Marion presents in L dole et la distance in terms of “da distance,” a concept that apparently defies conceptuality and so is Jeft unde-

fined, although not completely undescribed. In that text, distance occurs both between myself and others and between myself

and God."'! It therefore functions as a guarantee for the maintenance of a sort of Levinastan alterity.'"? Distance escapes repre-

sentation, possessing an anteriority that 1s reminiscent of immemoriality.'”° It precedes even ontological difference.'’’ But most interestingly for our purposes, distance forms what Marion names the “paternal horizon,” which is non-objectifiable and unthinkable.'"* In this early work (L idole et la distance appeared in

1977) it is distance (the horizon of the father) that cuts across being (or, it could be said, the call of being). By the time of God Withoul Being (1982), it is God’s call that cuts across being accord-

ing to the horizon of the gift. And, as we have seen, by the time Marion, GWB, 100. % Marion, /D, 244: ‘Bref, Pancériorité et Pextériorité herméneutiques de fa distance la dispensent de toute définition relevant du ‘langage-objet’ (ou supposé tel). Parce qu'elle définirait, la distance ne se défnirailt pas.” Distance is, of course, one of the themes to which Hans Crs von Balthasar heavily subscribes.

' Marion, J2, 247.

Nevertheless, dns distance does not seem to have the same notion of “curved space” for which Levinas allows. " Marion, £0. 2>4: “La distance ... échappe clle aussi a toute représentation,

puisque tout objet représcntable, comme toul sujet représentateur, dépendant déja Vune distance définitivement antéricure.

Marin, £2, 26-4.

™ Manon, #2. 254: “Plus, horizon paternel de la distance se soustrait, par définition, a torte mdquisition qui prétendrait Pobjectiver, Ce dont il s’agit, en cffet, avec lai, c'est précisément de Vin-objectivable de l'impensable qui outrepasse la négation méine des pensables, de Virreprésentable qui esquive ka néga-

ion meme du representable.” (Further, the paternal horizon of distance withdraws, by definition, trom all questioning that would purport to objectify it. What it has to do with, m effect, is precisely the unobjectifiable of the unthinkable that goes beyond even the negation of what is thinkable, the unrepresentable that avoids even the negation of the representable.)

108 RETHINKING GOD AS GIFT of Réduction et donation (1989), it is the horizon of the call, a call that is undecidable but which could be the call of the father, that exercises itself before the claimn of being. Let us add to this brief survey the fact that, in the ‘““Réponses a quelques questions,” which is part of the Revue in 1991, Marion

is apparently prepared to consider the connection between his earlier works and Réduction et donation. He is also prepared to discuss the possibility of a phenomenon of revelation, observing that

“to my knowledge, this locution does not occur in Réduction et donation, but a lucid reader cannot help but guess that the question of revelation governs this work quite essentially,””!°" And in the subsequent essay, “The Final Appeal of the Subject,” Marion concludes: “More essential to the / than itself, the gesture that Interlocutes appears, freely but not without price, in the figure of the claim—as that which gives the Jas a myselfrendered to itself. Grace gives the myself to itself before the 7 even notices itself. My

grace precedes me.”!'!® One could make a case that we are referred here to the Christian God, the divine Giver. The Omission of the Es Gibt

The idea that Marion has in mind a divine Giver brings us to consider a final question with regard to Réduction et donation, one that 1s raised in the Revue by Jean Greisch.'" Given his interest in donation, why does Marion not refer, in this work, to the Heideggerlan material on es gibte!!? The answer could lie in the carlier texts Litdole et la distance and God Withoul Being. In the former, Marion devotes several pages to a discussion of the es gibt. Begin“" Marion, ROQ, 73; my translation. We could add to this list Marion’s comments in “Metaphysics and Phenomenology: A Relief for Theology”; or in “Le phénomene saturé,” in Jean-Francois Courune, Jean-Louis Chrétien, Michel Henry, Jean-Luc Marion, and Paul Ricoeur, Phénomenclogie et théologre (Paris: Cri-

terion, 1992) (hereafter Courtine et al., PF], 79-128 [hereafter Marion, PS]; trans. by Thomas A. Carlson as “The Saturated Phenomenon” in Philosophy Today 40 (Spring 1996): 103-24. 10 This essay appears im its fullest translated form in Critchley and Dews, DS. The quote is from p. 104. 1M Jean Greisch, “LT herméneutique dans la ‘phénoménologie comme telle,’ " Revue de Métaphysigue et de Morale 96, no. | (1991): 43-63 [hereafter Greisch, HPT}.

2 Greisch, HPT, 56. See also O'Leary, VRSG, 251.

REFIGURING GIVENNESS LOG ning with the question about what “brings into presence,” he speaks of the “gift” of presence, the bringing into presence that is accomplished in the 7 @.!'5 It is about meditating, he suggests,

not on that which there is, but on the fact that there 1s a “there is,’ which gives in withdrawing.'4 It is about focusing not on the given, but on givenness, or donation. Referring to “Time and Being,” Marion observes the play hetween donner (Geben—to give), donation (Gabe—the gift) and the es (/E—-it).' He notes that metaphysics masks the sense of giving, and that it is necessary to think donation from within donner and vice versa.''® Importantly, Marion emphasizes that Heidegger has in mind no verbal subject, no cause, no “indeterminate power,”’ when he speaks of the es.1"”

The es is named Ereignis, but Ereignis is nothing other than the giving that links being and time, which withdraws in their being given. In its withdrawal, however, the [reignis reveals itself according to its key characteristic: expropriation.''* Thus the Ereignes, which achieves and goes beyond in this ontologr

cal difference, never accedes as much to its proper sense than in disappropriating itself, since this is also how it makes “something else” accede to its characteristic. Its “absence” recovers 1ts highest “presence,” its withdrawal comcides with its proximity, since its retreat alone assures us of acceding to the “approaching proximity,

Nahhett |" Ereignis can never be objectified, and Marion emphasizes the similarity between it and what he calls distance.'*? Further, he suggests WS As T have already indicated, Marion observes that this is often the accepted

French translation, while maintamung a preference for ca donne. Marion, JD, 283. 14 Marion, [D, 284. "5 Marion, 1D, 285. 16 Manon, 1D, 286,

Marion, £2, 287, 14 Marion, JD. 288-90,

me Marion, 4), 291: "Done reigns, qui acheve et outrepasse en cela la difterence ontlolagique, naccéde jainais autanl a son propre qu'en se désappropriant, puisque c'est ainsi qu'il fait accécer “autre chose’ a son propre. J. reigns, dans abandon, assure le deer, et dans le donner le donne a penser. Son ‘absence’

recouvre sa plus haute ‘presence, son retrait coinckle avec sa proximité— puisque seul cc retrait nous assure daccéder 4 la ‘proximité approchante, Neh-

Aeut

"Marion, 3, 241].

P10 RETHINKING GOD AS GIFT that Ereignis is like “paternal” distance, although in that case Eveignas would need to be read according to distance.'*? He explores such a reading, coming to the conclusion that “the Evreignis can thus be understood im two ways, not unifiable, not contradictory, not concurrent: as such, the last word of being, and as medium or analogy of the trinitarian play (the gift of creation sending to and

deepening itself in the original filiation).”' The analogy is particularly strong in the case of withdrawal. Marion's treatment of es gibt in L idole et la distance is quite positive. Because Lreignis precedes and so defies ontological differ-

ence, it achieves the indifference to difference that is Marion’s chief interest.'** Its possible relationship to “paternal distance” is left open: there is no necessary ideological contradiction between them at this point, although Ged Without Berngwill read differently in this regard. But most importantly for our purposes, there is in Lidole et la distance the beginning of the link between the es gibt and a divine Giver. ‘This link will prove crucial to Marion’s theo-

logical position, and hence it threatens to undermine his philosophical interests. In God Without Being, during a lengthy passage

concerning the es g2bt where Marion elaborates two interpretations of giving, we discover his strong desire not only to think a donation anterior to that of being, but to specify a Giver, a desire that would forbid the suspension of the horizon of donation. And in this desire it is possible to recognize why Marion does net revisit the es gibt in Réduction et donation: his earlier interpretation of it would cauterize his later argument, In God Without Being, Marion construes God as gift in contrast

to God as being, Fis strategy involves not only showing that a metaphysical understanding of being is inadequate for God (along with Heidegger), but in showing that the Heideggerian elevation of being apart from (but implicitly above} God itself fails and can be theologically dismissed. As part of the latter move, Marion must once again deal with the es gebt, Fle begins with the 21 Marion, #D, 292,

™ Manion, §), 296: “1! Ereygnes peut done s‘entendre de deux nianieres, pon unifiables, m1 contradictoires, ni concurrentes: comme tel, dernier mot de l’Etre, ec comme médiun ou anafegon du jeu trinttaire (le don de création renvoyant a cts approfondissant dans la fltation originelle).” "3 Marion, £0, 301.

REFIGURING GIVENNESS Mik question of the relationship of the gift to being (/ Etre) and being ( étané), commenting:

No one more than Heidegger allowed the thinking of the coinct dence of the gift with Being/being, by taking Hterally the German es gibt, wherein we recognize the French #/ ya, there 1s: superimpos-

ing one and the other, we would understand the fact that there should be (of course: being) as this fact that i geves, ca donne. Being itself is delivered in the mode of giving—from one end to the other

along the path of his thought, from Sem und Zet to Zeit und Sen, from 1927-1962, Heidegger does not cease to meditate on this equivalence. Do we not delude ourselves, then, by claiming to discover in the gift an instance anterior to Being/being that distorts the ontological difference of Being/ being? Does not that which we apprehend as “otherwise than being” constitute precisely its most adequate and most secret thought?"

In response to this questioning, he maintains that “gift” and “giing” must be thought differently (not from each other, but from the Heideggerian conception), and not beginning with being/ being. Marion gives two possible definitions of the gift/giving: On the one hand there is the sense of the gift that leads, in the there 1s, to the accentuating of the 2f geves starting from the giving

itself, thus starting from the giving in so far as it does not cease to give itself; in this casc, the 2 that is supposed to give does not provide—any more than does the impersonal ion the threshold of the dy a—any privileged support.'”?

This is Heidegger's interpretation, mvolving no giver as such. It 1s interesting that Marion compares this giving to “what gives” in a painting, not only because visual art has a very important place in Marion’s work, but because he speaks here of giving as appropriation.'** What gives in a work of art is neither painter nor canvas, but something else altogether that allows itself to be “seen”: this is Marion’s regular phenomenological refrain. But here he interprets the painting as idol rather than as }7con—‘‘gifl as appropria4 Marion, GWH, 102.

85 Marion, GW, 102A. 6 Marion speaks of art in GW8 in his discussion of idols versus icons, and in La crowsée du visible, 2nd ed. (Paris: Presses Universitaires de France, 1996) [hereafter Marion, CY),

112 RETHINKING GOD AS GIFT tion, without any distance.”!?? The question of expropriation is left hanging. The second interpretation Marion offers of the gilt/giving distinction is as follows (and I quote at length, because in this passage Marion reveals a number of significant ideas): On the other hand, the gift can be understood starting from giving—at least, as it 1s accomplished by the giver. The gift must be understood according lo giving, but giving [donation] must not be understood as a pure and simple giving | donner]. Giving must be understood by reference to the giver. Between the gift given and the giver giving, giving does not open the (quadri-) dimension of appropriation, but preserves distance. Distance: the gap that separates definitively only as much as it unifies, since what distance gives consists in the gap itself. The giving traverses distance by not ccas-

lng to send the given back to a giver, who, the first, dispenses the given as such—a sending destined to a sending back. Distance lays out the muimate gap between the giver and the gift, so that the self withdrawal of the giver in the gift may be read on the gift, in the very fact that it refers back absolutely to the giver. Distance opens the mtangible gap wherein circulate the two terms that accomplish giving in inverse directions. The giver is read on the gift, to the extent that the gift repeats the giving of the initial sending by the giving of the final sending back. The gift gives the giver to be seen, in repeating the giving backward. Sending which sends itself back, sending back which sends—it is a ceaseless play of giving, where the terms are united all the more m that they are never confused. For distance, in which they are exchanged, also constitutes that which they exchange.'**

Here Marion expresses his position with admirable clarity. Giving, es gibi, is to be understood in terms of a giver, or rather, the giver.

And soon after, Marion identifies this giver: “Doubtless we will name it God, but in crossing God with the cross that reveals him

only in the disappearance of his death and resurrection.’’!”° Granted, we are in a book that has a theological orientation, but

there is no undecidability about this giving. “God” may be “crossed out,” but it is certainly God who orients the giving that Manion, GW 104. m8 Manion, GWB, 104. 20 Marion, GWB, 105.

REFIGURING GIVENNESS 113 exceeds being. Marion tries to protect God from reductionism not only by withdrawing God from intelligibility (by using the device of crossing out), but by introducing the horizon of distance. Distance serves to separate the terms (Giver and giving/gift, but thereby also Giver and recipient). The question is whether or not distance can separate the terms sufficiently to allow for infinite

interpretability. It seems to me that in making God an absolute term, Marion has potentially compromised his reading of es gedt. But at the same time, within the horizon of “distance” he utilizes

a mechanism that might otherwise be called “the trace, and which functions to protect the aneconomic quality of the imterruption (‘Distance lays out the intimate gap between the giver and the gift, so that the self-withdrawal of the giver in the gift may be read on the gift’’). In response to the question of Jean Greisch, it may be that Marion avoids dealing with the es gibt question in Réduction et donation

because he has already spelled out its implications elsewhere. Since he wishes to preserve the undecidability of the call, he cannot afford to insert his theological reading of es gzbt into this context. On the face of it, it seems that the problems raised by Laruelle, Janicaud, Derrida, and Greisch are confirmed by the theological material that precedes Réduction et donation. But this is too simple

a solution to a complex problem. We have, on the one hand, Marion insisting retrospectively that Réduction et donation is not a theological book, a view that is confirmed by the letter (if not the

spirit, according to some) of the text. But we have, on the other hand, an explicit confirmation by Marion that Réduction et donation fits in the context of his other works, which are either theological, or Cartesian, or both. And we also have his confirmation that “to my knowledge, this locution [phenomenon of revelation} docs not occur in Réduction ef donation, but a licid reader cannot help but guess that the question of revelation governs this work quite essentially.”’ How are we to resolve this tension? One way of interpreting it might be as follows. In Réduction et donation,

Marion is net writing an explicit work of theology: it demands no theological commitments and does not articulate theological themes. Instead, he sets out to develop a phenomenology, one that is expanded to encompass not only what is given in fullness

114 RETHINKING GOD AS GIFT of intuition but also that which gives itself without the completion

of signification. Nevertheless, in so doing he is working at the border of phenomenology and theology because he wants to allow for the possibility that less usual “objects” (that is, we learn

more fully in tant donné, phenomena of revelation} might be brought within the realm of phenomenological study.'*" Now, to the extent that Marion works at this interface, his work is very relevant for a renewed consideration of the relationship between philosophy and theology, particularly as it is opened by phenome-

nology. But the problems that arise at this interface are many, and they are articulated to a greater or lesser degree by the objections to his work that are represented above. It is not simply a question of Marion's having theological presuppositions in writing Réduction et donation, because the answer to that question is both yes and no. We have seen instead that beneath this general charge lie more specific questions that relate to the nature of phenomenology as such. Claiming that Marion has a theological agenda may be accurate, but it will also be confusing unless the main game is kept in mind. In fine, can phenomenology as a methodology sustain more than can be comprehended? If yes, then the theological connections might be validly developed. If no, then it seems that Marion’s work fails, and further that there is no point pursuing phenomenology’s relationship with theology. We are left, in the context of the present study, apparently unable to resolve the phenomenological problem of the gift, and therefore unable to resolve the challenge this problem poses to theology without recourse to dogmatic override. It is for this reason that this study, oriented as it is by that theological challenge, is driven chiefly to consider phenomenological concerns. To see how Marion reorients his phenomenology with an eye to his critics in Réduction et donation, we turn to the developments of Etant donne.

"18 There is an ambiguity a Marion’s work between the use of the terms revelafron and Revelation. Here [ will use the capitalized term when [am speaking of a specific event occurring in faith, in the Christian tradition.

Being G1 IN DEFENSE. OF GIVENNESS

ETANT DONNE, published in 1997, represents the fullest account of Marion’s phenomenology to date. Divided into five books, this

monumental work repeats but also clarifes and extends the achievements of Réduction et donation, responding to many of the

criticisms leveled at that project. At the moment we are concerned largely with the first book, which focuses on the formula reached in the final pages of Réduction et donation and developed

in the article “L’autre philosophie premiére et la question de la donation”: “as much reduction, as much givenness.”’! It is the same formula that Henry affirms in his article in the Revue“ Much as the title Réduction et donation leaves open a useful ambiguity, Etant donné allows Marion to implicate different phenomenological questions. While he plays with various alternatives, Marion ult-

mately suggests that we read “being given” as “it gives itself,” making étant auxiliary to denné, and so focusing on the giving.” ' Carlson's transkation of “autant de réduction, autant de donation” im Redierfon and Givenness is “so much reduction, so much givenness.” Manion, RAG, 205. [ prefer “as much” for aufaat because it keeps the sense of proportion between the extent of the reduction and the vielding of givenness. For the mntervenme arlicle, see Jean-Luc Marron, "Loautre philusophie premiére ct la question de la donation,” Insutut Catholique cle Pans, Philosophie PF: Le statu contemporain dela philosoplie premiere (Paris: Beauschesne, 1996), 29-50. 49 [hereafter Marion, LAPP], 34.

“Indeed, Manon midicates that iis because of Tenry’s “validation” of the formida that he “dares” to raise it to a “principle” of phenomenology. Marion, ED, 24.

‘Marion effects a shift from pvenness to fantdonué, a move that is explicated by Carlson, agai as translator, in a footnote to Marion's article “Metaphysics and Phenomenology: A Rehef for Theology,” 583: °° “The given of Being’ [fe donné détre| defines every being as ‘a betng-wiven’ [wn fant dennél, With the hyphenation of ¢faui-dorreé which we translate as bemg-given, Marion creates a single term that resonates on several levels. On the one hand, one can read the simple construction wherem a noun, (lant or un éant, is modified by an adjee-

116 RETHINKING GOD AS GIFT Marion seems to echo Heidegger here—the given attests to its givenness, rather than its entitiveness; the given folds back on its givenness, which is “the fold of the given.’ Etant donné is driven by two questions—and these we note well: whether or not phenomenology can go beyond metaphysics, and whether or not Revelation can be considered as a phenomenon. In this sense, Etant donnéis heir not only to Réduction et donation but also to a slim but significant volume published in 1992: Phénoménologie et théologie, a

collection of essays by Michel Henry, Paul Ricoeur, Marion, and Jean-Louis Chrétien, with an introduction by Jean-Francois Cour-

tme. Many of those named by Janicaud are represented in this list.” While the phenomenon of revelation is under consideration, Marion insists—in response to his critics—that he is not suggesting we have to posit a transcendent donor, that he is not restoring

metaphysics, and that he is not restoring the place of the transcendental subject, but simply allowing for the primary self-giving of “that which shows itself.""°

It is perhaps in response to those same critics that Marion undertakes an extensive defense of his reduction to givenness, tracing the link between them (reduction and givenness) to Husserl’s The Idea of Phenomenology. Using four textual examples, he argues

from Husserl that (a) it is not the appearing alone that validates a phenomenon as a given, but its reduced character; (b) that the phenomenological reduction operates to exclude the transcendence of what is not given absolutely, or (c} that transcendence and immanence are redefined in relation to the reduction; and (d} that the reduction allows for the transcendent to become immanent. In other words, all the examples qualify Gegebenheit in terms of the quality of the reduction. Marion observes: “The link between reduction and givenness is found to be established, and tive, donné, thus yielding the grven being or a gruen beng, On the other hand, one

can also read the common French locution “étant donné (que),”’ which in its normal usage means ‘being given’ (that) or ‘seeing that.’ Phenomenology allows

one to think the being-given in every given being, and thus the precedence of givenness over beings and their Being. The term grvenness itself can convey at least three interrelated senses: giving, givenness, and the given.” * Marion, ED, 6-7.

*Courune et al., PT. * Marion, ED, 10-11.

BEING GIVEN 117 by Husserl himself. A phenomenen only becomes absolutely given according to the extent to which it is reduced.’” And in the same way that Marion reemphasizes the credibility of his reading of Husserl, he reexamines the Heideggerian material with a view to legitimating his association of both thinkers with a reduction to givenness. Marion’s echoing of Heidegger is therefore not acctdental, and where he excluded discussion of the es gibt (which he translates ca donne) from Réduction et donation, here he reflects on it in depth.® In Being and Time, the ¢a donne accompanies and precedes be-

ing’s opening out according to the horizon of time, the only nonontic example of what makes being accessible. Being comes to Dasein under the figure of givenness. Heidegger affirms that the phenomenality of being (/¢tre) does not show itself in being (en élant) or as a being (un étant), but according to givenness.? Nevertheless, there is still an overt dependence on Dasein. Not until the later text ‘“Time and Being” does Heidegger recognize that being cannot be thought according to its own horizon, and hence dis-

cover the need to talk about a new horizon, that of givenness. Marion explains: To think “it gives” being (and time), to transpose being into the regime of givenness, nevertheless implies nothing arbitrary; firstly

because it is necessary to recognise the impossibility of holding being in the horizon of being (only a being is, being ¢s not), thus the obligation to assign to it a new horizon; subsequently because givenness, as soon as its first description, allows a reading of the most essential trait of being in its difference with being, its withdrawal.'” 7 Marion, ED, 24-25.

* Marion argues that the translation “ily a “in effect masks all the semantics of givenness which nevertheless structure the ‘es gibt’ " ED, 51 n. “Marion, ED, 50-53. '’ Marion, ED, 54: ‘‘Penser que ‘cela donne’ létre (et le temps), transposer donc l’étre en régime de la donation n'implique pourtant aucun arbitraire; d’abord parce qwil faut reconnaitre Vimpossibilité de tenir Pétre dans Vhorizon de létre (seul Vétant est, étre n'est pas), donc Vobligation de Vassigner a un

nouvel horizon; ensuite parce que la donation, dés sa premiére description, permet de lire le trait le plus essentiel de Pétre en sa différance d’avec létant, son retrait.”’

118 RETHINKING GOD AS GIFT This withdrawal (of the gift) is an essential part of the giving."! Between the giving and the gift there must be a difference that maintains ontological difference. Thus we do not really think being so much as its retreat.” Does Heidegger succeed in thinking givenness? Marion begins his response by saying that the cela is not to be thought as an enigmatic power, that it must not be thought, according to Heiclegger, as a cause. It has to remain indeterminate. Heidegger is bracketing all transcendence: it is the giving, not the “it,” that is important. Yet Heidegger gives the cela the name Eveignis, and Marion argues that this actually obscures the donative aspect. Ereents does end up functioning as an indeterminate power, since Heidegger does not preserve the indeterminacy of the “it.” Mar-

ion also wonders whether, if being disappears in the event, it meets the phenomenological exigency that it be exposed in the cela donne, Does the thinking of the Ereignis represent a phenomenological advance or a backward step? For Marion, Ereignis dissim-

ulates givenness. Asking whether the retreat leads back to givenness, being, or Ereignis, Marion asserts that it goes back to givenness, but that Heidegger does not want to confirm this emphasis. Heidegger and Husserl thus effectively reach the same point. Although they make use of givenness, they do not affirm it as the key, but instead focus on other principles: objectivity and hreignis. Marion’s solution 1s to link givenness with reduction, a reduction that would not delimit any horizon. Givenness would in this way become its own horizon.“

Having reasserted the legitimacy of his reading Husserl and Heidegger in terms of givenness, Marion then explores what givenness as a horizon might mean. Givenness only ever appears indirectly, in the fold of the given.’ As an example, he considers a painting, looking for ways in which its givenness might become

apparent.’? The painting might be seen as present-to-hand, yet Marion, £D, 55; “pour donner le don, le donner duit s’en retirer” (“lo give the gilt, the giving must withcraw”’). = Marion, &) 94—he.

Marton, 0) 56-60. Like objectivity in its link with the object, or Being in its difference from being,

Marion, £2, 60-62.

BEING GIVEN 119 Marion maintains that the painting is more than the sum of its dots. It subsists bevond its visibility: its appearance is not only in its subsistence. Another way of looking at the painting is to suggest that it 1s ready-at-hand. This is a better option because it gives a sense of craftspersonship. It is subsistent, but there is something to see in it besides what is visible. The painting implies a painter

or several painters, as well as spectators, an intention to paint, materials used, and so forth. In other words, it demands a decision to want to see more than the subsistent visible. However, this understanding is limited to funcional operations and ends.'" The painting is not really anything if it is taken in the manual sense." A third path is to suggest that the painting be considered 1m its

entitiveness. This is the Heideggerian approach, where art captures the truth of the being. But does it? Marion suspects that Heidegger remains tied to metaphysics here, since art is ordered to an end, be it beauty or truth.’* He suggests instead that beauty appears independently of the being of a painting. We see something as beautiful not because of its own thingness but because it captures a sense of things. The beauty 1s irreal. Marion offers the possibility that the work of art, far from capturing the truth of the

being, actually frees itself from it.’? In the end, the painting zs not.” The paradox of a painting 1s that it is not, and yet it appears all the more. In what, then, does the phenomenality of the paimting consist? Marion uses Baudelaire to explain: what a painting

requires 1s melody. The nonvisual analogy is used to express something that cannot be expressed in terms of real visibility. When a painting lacks melody it lacks its event-principle, its effect, ' The painting functions as (a) an aesthetic object of pleasure, (b) an object of value in the marketplace, or (c) an object of critical judgment. None of these assessments really grasps the painting as it gives itself. Marion, ED, 63-65. 7 Marion, ED, 65-67. '®& Marion, LD, 67-69.

'’ Once again he gives three examples. The painting is indifferent to the onuc circumstances of its appearance—it can be reprinted many times, but its beauty

will be affirmed only by other criteria. It does not appear because 11 is, but because it exposes itself; physical reality alone is not sufficient to make it remarkable. To see a painting, itis not sufficient just to see il. The excess of the painting unposes itself on me, gives itself to me. Further, paintings demand revisitation.

The painting does not consist of its thingness but in its mode of appearing, which can repeat itself at cach viewing in a new mode. “Marion, LD, 69-72.

120 RETHINKING GOD AS GIFT which is the invisible life of the painting.*' The effect defines the

phenomenality of the painting—its givenness. That invisibility can give itself is not contradictory, but becomes possible when we bracket those things that do not belong to a given’s pure phenomenality: its objectivity and its thingness. Invisibility makes visible.

So it becomes possible to speak of other things that give themselves without objectivity, such as time, life, and one’s word; or without being, such as death, peace, and sense. Marion uncovers here a new class of phenomena, vindicating his idea of a reduction to pure givenness.* Tt is at this point that we begin to see how revelation will become significant as a potentially invisible phenomenon. The idea that the phenomenon can be reduced to a pure given is subject to two objections, which Marion reduces to one. He observes that there are some phenomena that define themselves by their irreducibility to givenness, such as death and nothingness, and asks whether or not there are two types of phenomenal-

ity, one that reduces to the given and the other that does not. What would this mean for the universality of givenness? Then he

asks whether his reduction, which goes beyond the reduction both to objectivity and to “beingness,” is really the ultimate in reductions.” “These two questions (universality, primacy) join themselves into one: how to justify the privilege given to givenness?"’** We follow his response to these objections in some detail,

for it is highly significant for both phenomenology and theology.

Marion begins by saying that no thing is, or affects us, except insofar as iC 1s given to us.7* He maintains that this is even the case

with regard to the nothing—givenness by denegation—a givenness by absence or lack. It is a matter of discerning the type of givenness rather than the fact of givenness. The nothing gives 2 Marion, ED. 72-73. Marion uscs Cézanne to describe the effect: it engages

the soul, rather than perception or emotion, “Ieffet fait vibrer ame de vibrations, qui, bien évidemmient, ne représcntent aucun objet, ni aucun étant, et ne peuvent elles-mémics se décrire ou se représenter sur le mode des étants et des objets.” ED, 75. “2 Marion, /D, 73-78. “ With regard to the reduction to beingness, Marion uses élandiféand connects it to Heidegger. 4 Marion, ED, 79. “4 Marion, ED, 79-80.

BEING GIVEN [2] itself in anxiety, and this is not only a negative giving but a positive

one.?> The obscurity of the non-appearing gives itself (a) as the incomprehensible, where it gives the excess of the infinite (like Denys and Descartes); (b) as the weakness of intuition, where it gives the ideal of reason (Kant, Husserl}; and (c) according to the negative, where it gives dialectic (Hegel). Emptiness gives itself in

deception of the anticipation of perception, in desire.*” These are, in fact, givennesses without a given. Husserl has already suggested that this is the case with nonbeing, counter-sense, and con-

tradiction. In other words, Marion argues, givenness Is not the same as intuition. There can be a given that does not fulfil intuition. Marion suggests that deconstruction thus rests on “la donation différée.”*? Rather than non-givenness, Husserl speaks of enlarged givenness, although Husserl is to be interpreted carefully on the question of “representation.” Everything is given, but

sometimes in an empty manner. Additionally, there can be no exceptions to givenness, so it makes no sense to speak of a nongivenness or a negative givenness, since these must be first donated.*"

Marion notes the further objection that givenness presupposes the givenness to someone (ego, consciousness, subject, Dasein, life). This would mean that givenness would except those whom it affects. In the case of death, there would be no recipient and therefore no givenness. Yet according to Heidegger, death determines Dasein, which is paradoxical, For Heidegger, death is Dasein’s possibility par excellence, and defines its proper possibility. Death does not abolish the Dasein to which it gives, but gives to Dasein its ultimate determination of being, which ts being-towarddeath.*! Death gives impossibility; it gives the expertence of fini6 Tt gives itself by the intuiuon of essences or by categorial intuition. “7 Marion, ED, 81-82. 28 This is also a Levinasian insight. 2° Marion, £D, 82. This is very important in terms of the failure of the reduclion. °° Marion, £0, 81-84, “\ Marion, ED, 84-86. Of course, Heidegger's understanding of death is in this

way very different from that of Levinas, for whom death always refers to the death of the Other. “This is the fundamental difference between my ethical analysis of death and Heidegger's ontological analysis. Whereas for Heidegger death is my death, for me it1s the offers death.” Levinas in Kearney, DCCT) 62. In Derrida’s discussion of Heidegger, Levinas, and death in GD at 41-47, he

}22 RETHINKING GOD AS GIFT tude as an existential determination of Dasein.** So according to Marion, even death and nothingness are given in givenness, indubitably.*’ Now, the indubitabihty without condition of givenness would become unacceptable if it were conceived in a substantial mode. Instead, it can only he conceived as an act, and not a personal one, but a phenomenological one that cannot be separated from the reduction. Thus Marton holds that to affirm the universalty of givenness it 1s sufficient to try to deny it. It is always con-

firmed in its retreat.

Having affirmed his reading of Husserl and extended his reading of Heidegger, Marion is able to present a strong case for the legitimacy of a reduction to givenness. But there remains a final

issue to deal with: whether or not he has gone too far in using “givenness” to coordinate a number of words that have distinct meanings and usages (es g7bt, geben, geveben, Gabe, Gebung, Gegeben-

heit). Once again, he declares that it is not about exploiting an ambiguity but about stating a fact. The ambiguity is certainly there, but he does not find it necessary to exclude an idea that simply coordinates these different meanings. Looking further at the inevitable ambiguity of la donation, Marion explains that it has

an ineluctable duality. It means the given gift, but it has also a sense of givenness that disappears in the given. Ambiguity is really compares death as a moment of authenucity and the responsibility we bear for the other’s death. Blanchot picks up on the solipsism miherent in Fleidegger's perspecuve of death as ultimate possibility of mmpossibilitv. Sce Blanchot, Sf, especially in the section entitled “The Work and Death's Space’: “Can T die? Have [the power to die? This question has no force except when all the escape routes have been rejected. It is when he concentrates exclusively upon himself in the certainty of his mortal condition that man’s concern is to make death possible. IL does not suffice for him that he is mortal, he understands that he has to become mortal, that he must be mortal vice over: sovereignty, extremely mortal." SE, 96. © Marion, £D, 86-87 “itis a little: like Descartes’s argument for the existence of the cogito, except

that the indubitability factor 1s different. Concerning the indubitability of the eo, it is possession that is invoked, whereas the indubitability of givenness has to do with abandonment. Givenness abandons itself in favor of the given. The mdubitable is never a being but.a universal act. Llow? Not as a transcendental (if indubitability were a transcendental 10 would inpose iiself prior to experience; transcendentals fix experience—giverness exceeds 11). The indubitability of givenness is not like that of the ego, but its inverse, although it does not destroy It. Marion, iD, 87-89. 4 Marion, £D, 89-90.

BEING GIVEN 123 the essence of givenness, and trying to do away with the reversion of the given to givenness would mean doing away with the given itself.’ Gegebenheil is, as his critics have pointed out, very difficult

to render, but Marion claims that his choice to translate it by da donation is faithful to Husserl’s use.** This is because “givenness”’

keeps the two senses of givenness: the result of givenness (the given) and givenness a8 a process (to give).”

RETHINKING THE GIFT

In the second of the five books that make up Lani donné, Marion addresses the question of the gift by placing it in the context of givenness. It forms a direct response to Derrida’s analysis of the

gift on two fronts: Marion asserts both that phenomenology is possible and that, from a phenomenological perspective, the gift is also possible. In what follows I will draw material from two sources, both Fiant donné and the earher (Gin French) “Esquisse dun concept phénoménologique du don,” only more recently available in English as a chapter in Merold Westphal’s Posimedern Philosophy and Christian Thought. The theological setting of the

article (hereafter referred to as “the Sketch”) has a particular pertinence to our discussion, while Hflant donné presents the material with greater luciclity. Marion introduces the second book of Etant donné again with a “ Marion, Ef}, 9)-97. ‘6 This may well be the case in French, but when it is retranslated into English there is a problem. “ Marion notes that Lowith uses two dilferent words (donnée and présence) but asks how we are to decade between them on any given occasion, Importantly, he also asks whether or not pivenness is to be equaled with presence. Marion, ED, 97-99, He claims that the translation of Gegebenhert by donnée is iwadequate. Marron, FD, 9S-10K).

& “Sketch of a Phenomenological Concept of the Gift.” Ttappeared im French as “Esquisse d'un concept phénoménologique du don” in Archive di filasafia, Anno 62, nos. 1-3 (1994); 75-94 [hereafter Marton, £], and is now translated by John Gonley, 5.J., and Danielle Poe as part of Postmodern Philosophy and Christian Thought, ed. Merold Westphal (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1999), 122-43 [herealter Marion, SPCG]. All translation mine unless indicated. Kant donné represents a more developed form of the argument, as Marion indicates in SPCC, 143 n,

{24 RETHINKING GOD AS GIFT reply to his critics. His interest in givenness is not theologically motivated, and it has no necessary metaphysical implications. Yet a juxtaposition of this text with the introduction of the Sketch is revealing. In the Sketch, Marion professes his interest in the links between the gift and revelation. The latter is characterized by an excess of intuition that gives it the appearance of a gift. We might see here something of the influence of Paul Ricoeur, who speaks of religious “feelings” (sentaments) “belonging to an economy of the gift, with its logic of superabundance, irreducible to the logic of equivalence.’ For Marion, both revelation and the gift can be thought from the horizon of givenness, which is the horizon of phenomenology.” In the article, he unclertakes his analysis of the gift with a view to coming to an understanding of revelation. But returning to Etant donné, we see the theological interest subject to far greater limitations. In this text, the phenomenological considerations are paramount: the task is to think givenness other than according to the model of efficient causality, a task that will involve thinking givenness along the lines of the gift." Noting that the gift has commonly been understood in terms of causality (giver gifts gift to recipient) and that such a (metaphysical) understanding defeats the gift, Marion asks whether or not the gift must remain an aporia. This leads him to an exposition and evaluation of Derrida’s analysis of the gift. The merit of Derrida’s discussion, he notes in the Sketch, is that it makes evi-

dent the connection between the problem of the gift and the problem of givenness. Using the Aristotelian terms of causality (which Derrida himself does not), Marion describes the metaphysical gift economy that Derrida has observed: “the donor gives the gift as an efficient cause, using a formal cause and a material cause (which is the gift) following a final cause (the good of the recipient and/or the glory of the donor); these four causes permit givenness to satisfy the principle of sufficient reason.’ Mar89 Paul Ricoeur, “Expérience et langage dans le discours religieux" [hereafter Ricoeur, ELDAR], in Courtine et al., P7) 15-38, 16. It 1s of interest that Ricoeur uses the phrase “economy of the gift” but connects it with “superabundance”’ rather than “equivalence.” Are we to read him in terms of Bataille on economy? ” Marion, £, 75: SPCG, 129-23. 4 Marion, £2, 108. * Marion, &, 76-77: “le donateur donne le don comme une cause efficiente, utilise une cause formelle et une cause matérielle (ce qui est comme le don)

suivant une cause finale (le bien du donataire et/ou la gloire du donateur);

BEING GIVEN 125 ion very deliberately links the metaphysical principles of causality

and reason with the character of economy that undermines the oift.

Marion then examines each of Derrida’s arguments. First there

is the demand for a lack of reciprocity. Vhe recipient must not make any return to the giver: the gift (or givenness) disappears as soon as it enters into a situation of exchange. Once again, Marion relates this to the need to satisfy the principle of sufficient reason,

“that of identity and the fourfold causality which the economy follows in its metaphysical regime.”** Derrida’s next argument is

an extension of the first: the recipient must not only not return anything to the giver but must remain unaware of the gift received. Here Marion makes an apparent modification to Derrida’s point: “The recipient only profits from a_ gift-——sheer gratuity—if he does not interpret it immediately as gift having to be given back, a debt to repay as soon as it is possible.’’"! The word immediately is of interest, because upon my reading Derrida is less concerned with an immediate return than with any return as such.** Marion has observed a connection with time, but it 1s not the same connection Derrida makes, as we will later observe. He also questions Derrida’s belief that a refused gift is annulled

in the same way as one that 1s accepted, arguing that there are many gifts that go unrecognized, such as life and love, and possibly also death and hate.*®* Marion’s interpretation of this lack of ces quatre causes permettent 4 la donation de satisfaire au principe de raison suffisante.”’ SPCG, 124; ED, 109.

4% Manion, £, 77: ‘celui @identité et la causalité quadriforme que suit, en son régime métaphysique, economic.” SPCG, 124. This analysis is largely repeated in ED, 108-10.

“Marion, £, 77: “Le donataire ne bénéficie dun don—pure gratuité—que s'il ne l'interpréte pas immeédiatement comme don devant étre rendu, dette a rembourser dés que possible.” SPCG, 125; ED, 114.

® Derrida’s reading of Mauss on the possibility of delayed repayment is of interest here, Derrida notes the différance that is “wrsertbed in the thing itself” by the requirement of delay (GT7/, 40). But this does not seem to remove, for Der-

rida, Mauss's gilt from the cycle of econamy. Perhaps an argument could be mounted, and this may be Marion’s insight, that the delay or différance is sufficient to disrupt the complete return of the gift. In other words, by the time the gift is recognized in a counter-gift, a return to the idenuty of the gift is impossible. *6 Marion, £, 78; SPCG, 125; ED, 11] n. Marion says that the true gift is one

where there is no object: “When one gives life, there 1s no object, when one gives death, there is no object, when one gives forgiveness, one gives no object.

126 RETHINKING GOD AS GIFT recognition is that the gift exceeds consciousness: a misunderstood gift remains perfectly given, since this meets the condition of no recognition,” By virtue of this possibility, Marion suggests

that the gift thus does not depend on the recipient, and even goes so far as to say that the recipient can be phenomenologically

suspended. The third of Derrida’s arguments, Marion notes, concerns the donor, who must also forget the gift. Remembering is at the risk of scli-congratulation: any reward would return the gift to the donor. Marion refers the donor’s awareness of the gift to the evo,

the transcendental and constitutive I, and since the gift is not where there 1s an ego, the donor can be suspended in a way simi-

lar to the recipient.“ Derrida’s last argument relates to the gift itself: for there to be gift, the gift cannot appear as gift. Marion It is [the law of] the gift chat one doesn’t hold to an object.” Jean-Luc Marion, personal interview, 21 November 1996 [hereafter Marion, Sorbonne interview}. V “Le donataire ne sait pas et n'a pas a connaitre quel don lui advient, précise-

ment parce quun don peut et doit surpasser tole claire conscience” (‘The recipient does not know and does not need to be acquainted with whatever gif] happens to him or her, precisely because a gift can and should surpass all clear consciousness’). Marion, £, 78; SPCG, 125; ED, 111. This is a crucial point in the

debate between the ovo authors. Derrida is secking not to reduce the gift to consciousness, and he does this by mamtaining a radical anteriority and endless undecidability. Marion likewise does not wish to reduce the gift to conscious-

ness, but he does so by taking the path of excess, where intentionality has a content but no object, much as with Descartes’s idea of the infinite. Do these two paths ultimately coincide? To the extent that Marion is prepared to name his excess, perhaps not. With regard to the misunderstood gift, 11 scems Derrida may agree to some extent. However, Derrida disunguishes between a misunder-

stood gift (not recognized as gilt) and an unappreciated gift (received as gift but not wanted). Marion does uot always deal consistently with this issue, and his text can appear self-contradiclory, as he goes on to say that a refused gilt 3s still fully given. See Jacques Derrida, “At This Very Moment in This Work Here I Am.” originally in Textes pour Rxananuel Leones, and then in Jacques Derrida, Psyche: frventions de autre (Paris; Galilée, 1987), 159-202, translated hy Ruben Berezdivin for inclusion in the collection Re-reading Levimas, ed. Robert Bernascon and Simon Critchley (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1991), 11-48 [hereafter Dernda, AT VM]. * “La donation suppose donc Tépokhé du donataire.” Marion, &£, 78; SPCG, 125; £D, 111-12. This seems a large step to take. Marion appears to be trying to say that whether or not a gift 1s given does not depend on the recipient. But at the sane dime, a reciprent remains one of the conditions of im /possibility of the

vit. Marion will make mach of phenomenological bracketing, but 1 am not altogether certain that uw abways works. " Marion, £, 78: SPCG, 125; HD 112-153.

BEING GIVEN 127 makes much of this “apparition” of the gift (apparition): it Is the visibility (what he redefines in Etant donné as the “permanent visibility,” or subsistence in presence or objectivity) of the gift as such that annuls it.*” Yet he observes that Derrida here recovers Heidegger's “phenomenology of the inapparent."“! For Marion, the non-appearance of the gift does not impede the phenomeno-

logical task: if the gift itself does not appear, there can still be a phenomenology of giving. Marion therefore finds baffling the paradox that Derrida embraces, which he expresses in Liant donné as an aporia: ‘‘Either the gift presents itself in presence, and disappears from givenness, to become inscribed in a metaphysical

system of exchange; or the gift does not present itself, but thus no longer becomes visible at all, thus closing all phenomenality of givenness.”* The two objections of Janicaud and Derrida with regard to givenness (its being implicated in metaphysical schemes of causality or subsistence in presence) are reflected in the gift. Marion’s solution is to think, along the lines of Levinas, a gift

that excepts itself from being and therefore from presence thought as subsistence.*? Yet Marion pushes the analysis further, and here his real point of disagreement with Derrida will emerge.

He quotes Derrida’s observations: “the truth of the gift... suffices to annul the gift,” and “the truth of the gift is equivalent to the non-gift or to the non-truth of the gift." Reading these statements via a process of formal argument, he arrives at two possible ways of understanding them. Following one way, he sug-

gests that non-gift and non-truth are equivalent, and that there-

fore the gifi is the truth. Alternatively, he suggests that the statements mean lo oppose the gift and the truth, making them mutually exclusive. Marion tends toward accepting the first interpretation, while proposing that Derrida would probably favor the second.” In the debate at Villanova, and in response to this very

point, Derrida maintains: “I would say that, in fact, if I had to Marion, £D, 113-14. "! Marion, 1, 79, ~ Marion, &, 79-80; §POG, 126; £2, 113-15,

™ Marton, £, 115-1. “4 Marion, &, 80-81; SPCG, 127-28, quoted from Derrida, O47, 49. In translation itis from Derrida, CT), 27. © This discussion all takes place in the text of the Sketch, but the association of the gift and the truth 1s relegated to the footnotes of hart dann.

128 RELHINKING GOD AS GIFT choose, it would not be so simple. ...I am referring to a traditional concept of truth, that is, an ontological-phenomenological concept of truth, as revelation or unveiling or adequation. From that point of view, I would say that there is no truth of the gift, but I do not give up on truth in general,’ ** Taking a further step,

Marion notes that Derrida distinguishes between a gift that ts something determinate (which Marion identifies as the annulled gift) and a gift that gives the condition of the given in general but which actually gives nothing.*’ Since the latter gift gives no-thing, it seems to fulfil the conditions of possibility and impossibility of the gift." But Marion rejects this option, too, because he sees in

ita hint of the metaphysical (he reads “condition” as “foundation’). He also rejects it because he maintains that the modification of the object of the gift from given to condition of the given allows neither for the passage from the gift to givenness nor for the freeing of givenness from the economic system.’? Now, Marion has indicated two points of disagreement with Derrida: on the

guestion of the truth of the gift, and on the question of the gift as condition of giving. At this juncture, therefore, it seems he may wish to argue for a gift that can appear (even if not in the present) and which can be determinate. But then he changes tack. According to Marion’s analysis, Derrida’s gift can only be thought out-

side presence, outside subsistence, and outside truth, and is therefore impossible. That is unless, he argues, Derrida’s gift does

not deserve the name of “gift.” Instead of rejecting outright * Derrida and Marion, O76, 72. 37 Marion, &, 81; SPCG, 128.

* And suits the giving of what does not exist. such as life, death and ume. On this point [read Derrida slightly differently, placing the aforementioned gifts in the more general category rather than as conditions of the given, except, perhaps, time. Marion, &, 81: SPCG, 129-30: ED, 117-18. i Manon, £, 82: SPCG, 129-30. In the Sorbonne interview he mates: “P have explained that Derrida says that if a gift is pertect, it is necessary that no one receives it, that no one gives it, and that no thing 1s given. According to him, the concept of the gift is a contradictory concept. Well, my response is that the gift isn’t a contradictory concept. In the gift, always, if there is a gift, there is a giver and a receiver, but rarely the two at once. And in a true gilt... there is no giftobject.” Marion argues slightly differently with regard to truth in ED, 116-19,

where he maintains that the gift can only be thought in dispensing with the (ruth of the gift as subsistence or presence—that 1s, he aligns himself a little more with Derrida.

BEING GIVEN 129 what Derrida says about the gift, Marion affirms that no gift can

be that which takes place in an economy, and that as a consequence there must be other conditions of possibility of the git. He argues that all previous thinking of the gift has been done according to the horizon of exchange and in terms of causality, whereas he will think the gift according to the horizon of givenness. Looking toward Aquinas, where the gift is properly a givenness without return, or that which loses itself, Marion asserts that

gratuity alone cannot suffice to define the gift.” It is at this point that the methodologies of the Sketch and Etané donné diverge. Where the Sketch continues by reducing the gift to the way it is experienced by the donor and the recipient, Liant donné proceeds by bracketing each element of the causal mecha-

nism of the gift in turn. The latter path is much less complex, although the former descriptions should not be abandoned, because they offer valuable insights into what Marion sees as the gift

“itself.” Therefore, while J will continue this study of Marion's articulation of the gift by way of Etant donné, 1 will also refer to the Sketch insofar as it augments this articulation. Marion's argument is essentially as follows: if we disconnect at least one of the three causal mechanisms of the gift, the gift ccases

to form part of a metaphysical construction and can be phenome-

nologically considered according to its givenness. By “causal mechanisms,” which is my description and not Marion's, | mean those elements that regularly constitute gift-giving: a donor, a recipient, and a gift. So, Marion’s first step in this process is to dis-

connect or bracket the recipient (le/la donataire), which means that we also consider the gift from the perspective of the donor. As we have scen in Derrida’s analysis, if the recipient precedes the gift (by expectation or demand) or remains after it (in gratitude), the gift 1s doubly disqualified because it becomes the effect

of a cause or involves reciprocity. If, on the other hand, the gift is considered from the perspective of the donor as pure loss, as something that cannot be returned because the specific recipient remains unknown, then it functions outside a causal or economic horizon. Giving takes place when we give as ifthe gift cannot be "' Marion, &, 82-83; ED, 118-21. ® Marion, ED, 124-2?b6.

130 RETHINKING GOD AS GIFT returned. This 1s the case when I give without knowing the identity of the recipient: when I give to a charitable organization, the end recipient of my generosity will in all likelihood remain unknown to me. Then there is the instance of my giving to an enemy who does not return or even accept the gift. Here giving ts in vain, without reason, an experience of sheer loss. There remains the

question, however, of whether or not a gift that is denied, not accepted, or not recognized is still 4 gift. Marion allows that it is because it remains lost, abandoned by the giver and not accepted by the recipient. And in the world of the lost, Marion suggests a new figure of resistance: the ungrateful one, one who not only refuses to pay back the debt engendered by the gift but also will not accept the debt in the first place. The ungrateful one proves, he suggests, that the gift can be fully given even without the consent of the recipient.®! As a further possibility, Marion conceives of a giving that has a universal destination and is so unspecified. From a theological perspective, this occurs in the parable of the sheep and the goats, where everyone is a potential recipient (the recipient becomes universal) because Christ, to whom I (really) give, is invisible. Alternatively, if I sacrifice myself on behalf of a community (give my life for my country, for humanity, for chil

dren), not only is no individual a recipient, but no “thing’’ is given.” Finally, | may not know whether or not I give. As a donor, I can never be conscious of the effect I produce on possible recipients. I cannot see myself as others see me. The sportsperson, the

artist, and the lover all give to those beyond them, but they do not see what they do: the giver withdraws from the gift. It ts, so to speak, the right hand giving without knewing what the left hand is doing."?

Before leaving the discussion of the donor (suspension of the recipient}, it is worthwhile returning to the Sketch to examine how Marion portrays the gift there. For what he is really doing in that context is trying to consider how the gift looks trom the donor’s potnt of view. Marion suggests that giving, for the donor, never signifies merely a transfer of property. It consists instead in Marion, ED, 128-29, “Marion, AQ, 130-31.

Marion, 4D, 134-35. Marion, £2), 139-41

BEING GIVEN 13] the marking of an occasion or feeling. The gift-object simply serves as a support to the “real’’ gift; it is a symbol of that gift, always inadequate to the fullness of what tt signifies. So according

to Marion, there is a distinction between the gift and the giftobject. This marks a significant departure from Derrida, who 1ncludes that which the gift-object symbolizes as part of the gift as such. In other words, for Derrida the gift is annulled in its recognition, whether it be real or ideal: Thus the gift never coincides with the object of the gift. Better, one could suggest as a basic rule that the more a gift shows itself to be precious, the less it is achieved in an object, or, what 1s equivalent to it, the more the object reduces itself to an abstract role of support, of occasion, of symbol. Conversely, the gifts that give most never give anything—not a thing, not an object; not because they disappoint the expectation, but because what they give belongs nei ther to reality nor to objectivity.”

Marion’s point, then, is this: the gift is not the gift-object, but that which the object (always inadequately) signifies. If the gift is not the gift-object, what is itr A gift becomes such, not at the moment when it is given, but at the moment when the

donor considers it able to be given. A gift becomes a gift only when it becomes donable, which might be rendered “donatable”’ or, following Conley and Poe, “givable.” Now if something becomes givable, it docs not itself gain anything: being givable is not a real predicate. The gift-object undergoes no change in itself as a result of its becoming givable. The transformation occurs totally

within the donor. Marion goes on to explain that the gift begins Manion, , 85: “Ainsi, le don ne coincide pas avec objet du don. Micux, on peal suggérer comme une régle de fond que, plus un don se montre précicux, moins il s'accomplit comme un objet, ou, ce qui y revient, plus objet s’y réchuit au role abstrait de support, occasion, de symbole. Réeciproguement, les cons qui donnent le plus ne donnent jamais nen—aucune chose, aucun objet; non quails décorvent Vattente, mais parce que ce quils donnent n apparent ni ala réalté, ma Pobjectté.” SPCG, 132-33. See Dernda, GFT, 13. This becomes an interesting qnestion, since for Derrida, gifts such as love, forgiveness, or “what one does not have” are possibilties. Their survival as gifts depends on them not being present, not bemeg any “thing” at all, but Marion would counter that these are the sorts of (non)}-things that are symbolized by gift-objects. This the wiclow's miles could be read as symbols of what she cloes not have. The difference between Marion and Derrida on this point might not be as clear as Hirst thought,

132 RETHINKING GOD AS GIFT as a result of a sense of obligation. The gift begins when the donor realizes that he or she owes something to someone:™ The gift begins and, in fact, is completed, as soon as the donor envisages owing something to someone, thus when the donor admits that he should be a debtor, thus a recipient. The gift begins

when the potential donor suspects that another gift has already preceded it, for which he owes somcthing, to which he must respond. Not only does the gift reside in the decision to give taken by the potential donor, but the donor can only thus decide insofar as he recognizes that another gift has already obliged them. The pift is decided.™

The gift thus arises as a result of both the recognition of givability

and the recognition of indebtedness. The upsurge of givability and the recognition of indebtedness always relate to an anterior gift, which prompts a new gift.

To what is the gift really reduced in this description? Is Marion’s gift, as the lived experience of the giver, simply the upsurge of givability? Is it my decision to giver Is it my acknowledgment of debt? Is it the noematic gift, given to consciousness, as givable? If a gift is a response to indebtedness, how does it escape the cycle

of exchanger It seems to me that there are at least two ways to read what Marion is saying, directly related to the ways in which he makes the various reductions. According to the first way, the new “definition” of gift at which Marion arrives would be as follows: a gift is a decision regarding givability that comes about in response to my recognition of being indebted. It would relate primarily to the exclusion of the transcendence of the gift-object. The gift would thus be the decision to view something as givable.

The decision would arise out of an anterior debt, involving a choice to acknowledge that debt. The gift itself would be neither * This novon of debt is, of course, completely opposite to what Derrida would consider appropriate. "Marion, &, 86: “Le don commence et, en fait, s'achéve, dés que le donateur envisage de devoir quelque chose a quelqu'un, donc lorsqu't] admet qu'il pourrait étre débiteur, donc donataire. Le don commence quand le donateur potent ie] soupcerine quun autre don la déja précédé, auquel il doit quelque chose, auquel il se doit de répondre. Non seulement le don réside dans la décision de donner prise par le donateur potenticl, mais celur-ci ne peut ainsi décider qu'autant quil reconnait qu’un autre don Ia déya obligé. Le don se décide.” SPCG, 133.

BEING GIVEN 133 the gift-object nor that which the gift-object symbolizes, but simply the decision to view the object or symbol as gift. The decision would not be that which is exchanged, since a decision “is” nothing.” The decision would be mine insofar as I chose to recognize

the claim of the anterior gift. Since the decision would be nothing other than a way of seeing something, it would escape all entry into an economy, even in being a response to an anterior gift. Yet such a reading of Marion scems generous. Perhaps the gift lies in the moment of decision, yet it is not the decision that is given, but the gift-object, be it real or ideal. And as soon as there is a response, it is hard to argue that there is no cause of this effect. How would Marion consider the anterior gift that gives rise to the obligation? It also seems that Marion's definition might

work in terms of a human donor, but what of a divine donorr If the gift always and only arises in response to a debt, what kind of anterior debt would prompt a divine gift? Surely wherever there is indebtedness, there is no gift. Would it make any difference if the anterior gift were undecidable? A second way of reading Marion would result in a “definition” with the following emphases: the gift 1s that which 1s witnessed in that trace of undecidable indebtedness that 1s given in the decision of response, that which is the only possible response to gift-

edness.”' This reading would remove the gift from an economy insofar as il takes away the donor as cause. The gift itself would he in what has always already been given. But is such a reading possible on the basis of the text? It seems unhikely. This ts mainly because, at least in the Sketch, Marion does not specify that the

indebtedness has an undecidable origin. Because of this factor, he is really unable to effectively remove the gift from the horizon of causality.

[tis not difficult to see why some of these aspects of the donor’s

experience of the gift are not brought out in a reading of Etant donné. Nevertheless, the Sketch is a current text in the sense that its translated version was published after that book, and it could be argued that since many of its conclusions are not clearly repu“ And remembering that according to Derrida, an aporta can only be negotr ated by decision. "This would be consonant with a reading of Marion that emerges from later material, where the gift gives itself in giving “receiving.”

134 RETHINKING GOD AS GIFT diated, it still has a bearing on Marion’s position. In any case, having examined it, we are well prepared to continue with the second phase of the suspensions carried out in Etant donné: the suspension of the donor. When the donor (l donateur, la donatrice) is suspended, what we have to consider is the experience of the recipient, who is cast In terms of an inability to respond to a particular giver. This is not

quite to go so far as to say that the recipient cannot know if the gift is a gift (Derrida), but it is still to insert an element of risk in the receiving. Can an anonymous pift still be a gift? Marion illustrates that this can be so with some examples, the first of which is that of heritage. I receive a great deal from the State, to which I

am obliged to respond by paying taxes. But in actual fact, it is not the State that provides these things, but others who, like me, contribute to the state. So when I make my response to the state In paying taxes, Iam not responding to the individuals who make it possible for the state to give. Everyone gives, but at the same ume, no one gives. Alternatively, where the donor is not anonymous in this dispersed sense but anonymous in that I do not know who he or she 1s, the economic cycle of the gift is broken.”? When itis impossible to gain access to the donor, the recipient is in the posiuon of having to recognize him- or herself as forever in debt. This is, in fact, how Marion goes on to speak about subjectivity. Indebtedness emerges once again with the recognition that I receive myself as a gift without a giver. The gift 1s always and already anterior, subject to différance.”*

The section of the Sketch on the reduction of the gift brings to light the possible differcuces between the decisions to give and to receive. Marion notes that it is not only giving that is potentially arduous, but receiving as well. That is because the gift (whatever

it “is’) may be something unexpected, or not wanted, or even feared. To accept a gift means to renounce my independence, because it means that I will owe something because of it. Already,

Marion’s language suggests that he 1s still trapped within the causal horizon he hopes to escape. But he then adds the rider, along the lines that we have seen in [tant donné: ” Marion, £D, 136-39. * Marion, £D, 139.

BEING GIVEN 135 Let us note well that it is not first or foremost about a recognition

of debt towards the donor, such that we would be driven from {thinking} the gift according to givenness to [thinking] the gilt according to an economy; because this recognition of dependence on a donating gratuity remains even if the donor stays unknown or is completely lacking (so towards absent parents, Nature, indeed the State etc.); it could even be that this recognition weighs all the

more if it is not possible to attach it to any identifiable partner; because such a gratuity puts tn question nothing less than the autarky of the self and its pretension of self-sufficiency.”

Allowing for the donor to remain unknown, Marion thus allows for the possibility that the anterior git might somehow be immemorial in origin. Additionally, he considers how “the gift is decided” with regard to the recipient. Deciding to receive the gift means deciding to be obliged by the gift. It is the gift that wields its influence on the recipient, effectively provoking the recipient to decide in favor of it, prompting the yielding of self-determination to determination by the reception of the gift.” He concludes that “according to the regime of reduction, the lived experience of consciousness where the gift gives itself consasts in the decision of the pift [emphasis added ]—that of receiving the gift by the recipi-

ent, but especially that of persuading the recipient to the gift by the gift itself. The gift gives dse/fin giving to be received.” “Marion, £, 88: “Notons bien quill ne s’agit pas dabord ni surtout dune reconnaissance de dette envers le donateur, telle quelle nous reconduirait du don selon la donation au don selon l'économie; car la reconnaissance de dépendre d'une gratuité donatrice demeure méme si le donateur reste inconnu ou manque absolument (ainsi envers les parents absents, la nature, voire Etat, etc.); il se pourrait méme gue cette reconnaissance pésc dautant plus qu'elle ne peut se fixer sur aucun partenaire identifiable; car une telle gratuité met cn cause rien de moins que Tautarcie du soi ct sa prétention d’auto-suffisance.”’ SPCG, 136.

*® Marion, k, 88: “La décision entre le donataire potentel et le don ne s’exerce donc pas tant du premier sur le second, que du second sur le premier: le don, par son attrait et son presuge propres décide le donataire a se décider pour lui, c’est-a-dire le décicle a sacrifier sa propre autarcic—l’autarcie de son propre—pour le recevoir.”” SPCG, 136. © Marion, £, 88: “en régime de réduction, le vécu de conscience oti se donne

le don consiste dans la déciston du don—celle de recevoir le don par le donalaire, mais surtout celle de décider le donataire au don par le don lui-méme. Le don se donne en donnant de le recevoir.” My translation of this passage is awkward, and I add here what Conley and Poe arrive at: “in the regime of reduction, the experience of consciousness in which the gift gives itself consists in the deci-

136 RETHINKING GOD AS GIFT What Marton has observed regarding the relationship between

gift and recipient, he relates to the relationship between donor and gift. A gift is only possible where the “protagonists” recognize it in “a being, an object, indeed in the absence of being and object of an immediate relation between them.’’” In other words, it is about seeing the gift correctly, of having a particular sense for reading it. It is a phenomenology or hermeneutics that allows the gift to present itself, which means seeing the gift according to a donating horizon. This also means that neither donor nor recipient is an agent of the gift so much as acted upon by givenness." The gift, as that which “is decided” (or decides itseif}, need not be read economically but can be appreciated simply as the given, it obtains its character as given only from the horizon of givenness. In this way Marion maintains that the gift is outside any economy, outside any causality, and outside any agency. The third part of the parenthetical process suggested to us by Marion is the suspension of the gift itself. The reduced gift is one that may not be anything at all: it may be a promise, reconcilia-

tion, friendship, love or hate, life or my word. In this case, an object might represent the gift, but in an inversely proportional way. He uses the example of the conferring of power on a leader, which is representect in various insignia but not merely equal to them. The difficulty involved with a gift that is not anything at all is that it can be difficult to recognize. What determines such a gift

as gift is an act of fatth, a new hermeneutical stance, and what changes, when this risk of identifying sometlung as givable ts sion of the gift—the decision to receive the gift by the recipient but especially the decision to decide the recipient of the gift by the gift itself. The gift itself gives by giving its reception.” Marion’s use of words relating to décider is frequently confusing. Where he uses se décider T have translated it by “to be decided.” But he manifests a strong tendency toward personifying the gift. Where he uses se dérider @ it las more of a personal sense (“to persuace, convince, decide’). It also secms, in examples such as this one as well as the one menioned in the previous nate, that he does wish to underline that sense. The gift self mfluences the recypient. For that reason, se décider might also suggest “to decide itself,” im the same way that se denver means “to be given,” but also suggests “to give Hsell” SPCC, 136.

@ Marion, &, 88: “un étant, ti obpet, voire dans Vabsence détant et dobjet dune relation immediate entre eux.” SPCG, 136. * Marion, £, 89; SPCG, 136. Here it comes back to seeing, or to seeing correctly. In the corresponding passage in £D, 143-47, Marion opens us the element of risk or undecidability m interpretation.

BEING GIVEN 137 taken, is not the object itself, but its way of appearing, its phenom-

enality. This occurs for both donor and recipient.” Marion indicates that he has achieved the description of the phenomenological gift, which is quite unlike the sociological or anthropological versions. [t overcomes the deficiencies of these gifts insofar as they are implicated in causality and reciprocity. Further, it enables Marion to think the gift otherwise than according to transcendence, which, he claims, is the complicauon that most readily leads to his being accused of doing theology. But there is more. If one were to think theologically, he claims his phenomenological gift would be on the side of revealed, rather than rational, theology.* “Revealed theology could in return be defined as a thought of the gift without reciprocity, because without transcendent condition external to itself.’’*! This 1s, of course, highly relevant to the question that motivates this book: how is it possible to speak of God as gift? Marion's gift has been defined in a purely immanent way, with givenness characterized intrinsically, and he seeks to show further

how the manner in which the gift gives itself is the same as the manner in which the phenomenon shows itself. ‘This effectively means that all phenomenality will be able to be clescribed as gift, a point that underscores his connection of the many cognates of Gegebenheit. It is a point that is not lost on Derrida, and one against

which he will protest. But Marion maintains that he is able to achieve this without implicating phenomena-as-gifts in any metaphysical structure. His disconnection of any one of the three elements that would together constitute a gift economy enables him to sidestep the questions of exchange and causality. As a gift 1s

given, so the phenomenon.” And according to this reading of phenomenology, it becomes possible to be open to any type of phenomenon that may give itself, RETHINKING THE GIVEN: DETERMINATIONS

By delimiting the horizon according to which phenomena are given, Marion hopes to open a potentially unlimited “space” for Marion, ED, 147-61. 80 Marion, ED, 161-64. *! Marion, ED, 163. *2 Marion, £D, 164-66.

138 RETHINKING GOD AS GIFT the non-objective to manifest itself. But what exactly is given in this manifestation, and how is it given? Marion devotes two sections of Etant donné to a discussion of this question, extending in particular his 1992 article “Le phénomeéne saturé.””™ In Etant donné Marion maintains that giveriness is equivalent to

phenomenality.* He suggests that his method is a sort of empiricism, albert one that does not limit itself to the sensible, and he specifies three requirements of an approach by way of givenness that will enable the given phenomenon to be described. Givenness must allow us to describe tnirinsically the phenomenon as purely and strictly given, without reference to transcendence or to causality. Givenness must then determine the phenomenon as irrevocably given, so that the mode of phenomenality can be assessed, And givenness must radically determine the phenomenon as given, so that we consider the phenomenon precisely as and because it is integrally given.*®

How are we to determine that the given has been given mtrinsically? The constitution of the given 1s cquivalent to the giving of lis sense (Sinngebung), but this emphasis on immanence can take away both from the initiative of the given in giving itself and, as Marion points out, from the reality of its givenness as such. This Marion interprets in terms of the gift, which means that we enter immediately the somewhat murky waters of Marion’s debate with Derrida and Greisch about the link between givenness, the given, and the gift. What is important here is that Marion wants to retain a characteristic of the gift—that it comes “from elsewhere” (following Aquinas)—as a characteristic of the given. Alerting us to the problematic implications of this insistence, in that 1t may draw us into the possibility of exchange and causality, Marion limits the “from elsewhere” characteristic to an aspect of the phenomenological mode of appearing so that he can exclude any metaphysi-

cal indication of causality. The given thereby does not need to “? Marion, PS.

“In a more recent article still, “L’événement, le phénomeéne et le révélé,” Transversatilés: Reoue de L.'fnstitut Catholique de Pans 70 (April-June 1999): 4-25,

21, Marion more carefully distinguishes between the given and phenomenality, a distinction that can be read into Etant donnéin the sense in which he means it here (it is in being received that the given ts phenomenalized), but which 1s articulated more clearly in the later piece, 4 Marion, fe), 169-73.

BEING GIVEN 139 suggest an origin, a cause, or a giver, and it appears independently. One of the essential traits of the given phenomenon is ifs “ana-

morphosis,” its need to be put in perspective by its recipient.” Now Marion makes a very important move. Affirming that anything that is visible must appear, and so have a form, he distinguishes between unformed and informed form. The latter 1s what

renders the phenomenon yistble and enables it to be distincuished from other phenomena. Yet in contrasting the two forms, he asserts that only someone with the capacity to see will recog-

nize the informed form, that which shows itself. Marion leaves open the possibility that there can ‘‘appear” what is unformed, while it may not be put in perspective until the recipient is capable of performing what might be described by others as a hermeneutical act.*” One way of interpreting this move is to suggest that

it prepares the ground for Marion to promote phenomena that cannot be understood (unformed form) but can be interpreted (informed form) by a person who is “able to see.” The anamorphic phenomenon is further described by Marion as contingent and factical, which means that it can “arrive” or “happen” as a lived experience but without being expected or understood, or at least without being understood fully." Facticity 1s a type of exposure: | become the objective of the object, not it for me; I expert

ence the phenomenon as a falt accompli, always and already a fact." The given is also described in terms of an “incident” (or “accident’’), which reinforces its suddenness.” Once again, there is a clistinction between an unformed and an informed appearance. A particle can appear lo me without my being able to contextualize it; a painting can appear to me without form, but simply as the impact of color. Turning to a Levinasian example, the face

of the Other can impose itself on me without my being able to “An “anamorphosis’ is a “distorted drawing appearmg regular from one point’ (O#D): in other words, the anamorphic effect requires that the viewer hod the perspective from which this regularity will emerge. While perspective may scem to be at the initiative of the viewer, Marion emplrasizes that it nmposes self on the viewer from the given. 7 Marion, &D, 174—95.

* Marion, £D, 195-99. ™ Marion, £D, 211-12.

" Marion, £D, 213-21.

140) RETHINKING GOD AS GIFT think it as substance. In Descartes, Marion finds a recognition

that there are some “incidents” that remain unable to be thought, not because thought is deficient, but because what is

given sunply exceeds the capacity of thought."! What gives itself is neither an object nor a thing, but instead a ‘“‘pressure” that takes place in an event beyond my control, an effect that is not subject

to the requirement of a cause.” In this liberation of the effect or event from the cause, several important characteristics emerge. The event is irrepeatable: no two events are alike, and while every event has precedents, it can only be spoken of as an event if it exceeds these precedents.” In other words, every self-manifestation adds to the visibility of the phenomenality of the world. Additionally, every event sets off new possibilities—not metaphysical

possibilities, but possibiliues that cannot be foreseen. The event

seems inpossible, since it occurs outside essence, outside the principle of contradiction, without the notion of cause and suspending the principle of sufficient reason. Yet Marion argues that “possibility does not exercise itself firstly on essence in order to preview its effectivity, but, in an exactly inverse sense, by a proceeding towards form delivering an arrival, which provokes a fait

accompli and finally liberates the incident ‘outside essence.’ ’’ The determination of the phenomenon by anamorphosis means that the phenomenon surges into visibility, and it is necessary to expose or even submit oncself to the phenomenon in order to receive it.” All three of Marion's exigencies—that the given be given intrinsically, irrevocably, and radically—are observed in his analysis. It is given intrinsically because the phenomenon can be described

without reference to a cause, a real essence, or a constituting I, since each of these conditions is bracketed. (With regard to the constituting I, Marion explains that the I does not go beyond its transcendental role as a screen for lived experiences.) The given "4 Marion, &D, 223-24.

" Marion, £D, 225-36, * Marion, £D, 240-41, Marion, &£D, 245: “la possibilité ne s'exerce pas d’abord sur une essence pour prévoir une ellectivilé, mats, en sens Cxactement inverse, par une montée vers la forme célivrant un arrivage, qui proveque un fait accompli et libére enfin Vineident ‘hors de essence.” ™ * Marton, £D, 2-46.

BEING GIVEN 141 is given irrevocably because as fait accompli and event, the phe-

nomenon is irrepeatable, and because it is reduced.” The third requirement—radicality—is demonstrated insofar as all phenom-

ena, and not just those of a limited region, are subject to the fold of givenness. This means that it is possible to describe any phenomenon as (#¢tant donnée.”

RETHINKING THE GIVEN: DEGREES OF GIVENNESS

That all phenomena can be understood with reference to givenness allows us to question the variauon in degrees of givenness. We note well that at this point Marion expresses a caution in linking phenomenology and religion, since he recognizes that what can be objectively defined may lose its religious specificity, while what is religiously defined may lose its objectivity. Importantly, his

reading is that the religious phenomenon is impossible, or marks the point at which phenomenality is no longer possible.” Nevertheless, this view of the impossibility of the religious phenomenon rests on the assumption that a phenomenon its that which Is possible. Marion prefers to ask about the terms of possibility, and to think about the religious phenomenon as a “privileged indication of the possibility of phenomenality.””™ This leads to a lengthy con-

versation with Kant, for whom possibility means that which ac-

cords with the formal conditions of experience. For Kant, possibility depends on phenomenality: not on the phenomenal object as such, but on its power to be known. Like Leibniz, Kant lies this power of knowability to the principle of sufficient reason.'’ In contrast, Husserhan phenomenology opposes the Kantian definition of phenomenality with a “principle of principles” that admits of phenomena without condition.'’' However, this principle is problematic where it seems to limit phenomena to % Marion, ED, 246-47.

” Marion, £D, 248-49. * Marion, PS, 79-80. ED largely repeats what is propounded im this seminal article. ” Marion, PS, 80; ED, 251 ff.

' Marion, PS, 80-83; ED, 253-57. '™ Marion, PS, 83-84; ED, 257-58. Marion quotes what he has elsewhere listed

as the third principle of phenomenology.

142 RETHINKING GOD AS GIFT the constituting intuition! According to this principle, phenom-

ena can therefore only appear according to a horizon,' It is these factors that seem to exclude the possibility of an ‘‘absolute”’ phenomenon. So Marion asks whether it is possible to envisage a

phenomenon that is unconditioned, having no horizonal limits, or going beyond the horizon, and irreducible to an J, in that the I would be constituted instead of constituting." It is here that he perccives an opening for the thinking of religious phenomena." The impossibility of unconditioned and irreducible phenom-

ena Is related to the determination of phenomena given in a weakness of intuition, So Marion asks about the possibility of phenomena that are instead saturated in intuition: “why not respond with the possibility of a phenomenon where intuition would give more, indeed immeasurably more, than the intention would ever have

aimed at, or could have foreseen?’ Kant takes up the possibility of an intuition for which an adequate concept cannot be found when he speaks of aesthetic experience.’ Where there is an excess of intuiuion, there is an excess of givenness.""* “Intuition no longer exposes itself in the concept, but saturates 1 and renders it overexposed—invisible, not by default, but by an excess of hight.”'" How could such a phenomenon be described? Marion m Marton, PS, 84-86: £D, 262-64. Mm Marion, PS, 86-88; #D, 259-62.

wi Marion, 25, 88-80; ED, 264-63. Note Ricoeur once again, in tetms of not being a prisoner to unlentionality or representation, ELDR, 17-18.

Marion, PS, 89-90. Marion, PS, 103: “pourquoi ne répondrait pas la possibilité Pun phéno-

méne ou Vintuition donnerait plus, vorre démesurément plus, que Pintention n’auralt jamais vis¢, mi prévur’” ED, 275-77, Manion’s footnote on page 276 of ED is instructive: “Nous proposons de parler de phénomeéne saturé et non pas satu-

rant, comme on nous l’a parfols suggéré. En effet, c'est Fintuition qui sature tout concept ou signification, en sorte que ce phénomene sc manifeste bien sur un mode saturé par mtuition saturante. Plus, Pantuition qui le sature le sature uniquement au nom de la donation: le phéenomeéne saturé Vest (abord de donation. Certes, un tel phénoméne sature-t-il ensuite et par conséquence le regard auquel tl se donne a vow et connaitre; on peut done a la rigueur le dire aussi saturant. Pourtant la saturation qu'il exerce dans le chainp de la coumaissance résulte sculement de celle qu'il regoit dans le champ de la donation; la donation détermine toujours la connaissance et non inverse.” Mm Marion, PS, 103; BD, 278. MS Marion, PS, 104.

M™ Marion, PS, 105: “Pintuition ne s'expose plus dans le concept, mais le sature ct le rend surexposé—invisible, non pomt par défanit, mais bien par excés

de himiére.”’

BEING GIVEN 145 sketches an answer using the Kantian categories of quantity, quality, relation, and modality—except that the saturated phenomenon relates negatively to these categories since it exceeds them: not an object, the saturated phenomenon prefigures the possibility of a phenomenon in general.'""

The saturated phenomenon exceeds the category of quantity because it defies the ability of intuition to apply successive syntheses to it. It cannot be aimed at, ts thus unforeseeable, and cannot

be measured according to what has preceded it.'" It exceeds the category of quality because it defies the ability of intuition to bear it: it is blinding, giving reality without limitation or negation, an excess, glory, joy, an overflow.’ The saturated phenomenon is absolute according to the category of relation because it defies the ability of intuition to bring it back to any analogy with experience.''* Marion asserts that not all phenomena have to respect

the unity of experience, giving as an example the “event,” to which he has already referred in the determinations.’ “Event, or unforeseeable phenomenon (from the past), not exhaustively comprehensible (from the present), not reproducible (from the future), in short absolute, unique, happening.”'! The saturated phenomena goes beyond any horizon, unable to be limited by it, saturating it, or in fact playing on several horizons at once.''° And 10 Marion, PS, 105-6; £D, 280-88. Mt Marion, PS, 106-8. 2 Marion, PS, 108-11. Marion observes, incidentally, that holiness blinds us to the One we cannot see without dymg. PS, 110. Mt Manon, PS, 112-18. Ml Marion, 28, 112-15. "> Marion, #S, 113: “Evénement, ou phénomene non prévisible (a parur du passé), non exhaustivement compréhensible (a partir du présent), non reproductible (a partir chu futur), bref absolu, unique, advenant.” U6 Marion, PS, 116-18. See also Marion's discussion of Kant on this point in ED at 289-96. Marion likes neither the necessity of a horizon nor the necessity

of time as that hormon, asking whether there are some phenomena that go beyond thear hurizons, ¥et agam he goes on to say that it is not about dispensing

with a horizon altogether, since there can be no manifestation without a horizon, but about using horizon in another mode, freeing it from its anterior de-

limitations so that it does uot forbid the appearance of an absolute phenomenon, Marion imagines two cxamples. In the first example, the phenomenon fits within the horizon but at the same time pushes it open, working against it. In the second cxample, the phenomenon goes beyond the limits of the horizon. It seems as if Marion is speaking about seemg the phenomenon according to cifferent horizons that are in fact opposed, so that the phenome-

144 RETHINKING GOD AS GIFT it exceeds the final category of modality because it is irregardable. Where Kant’s use of modality relates to the accordance of objects of experience with the power to know, which inevitably relates to a transcendental I, Marion argues that with a saturated phenome-

non, the I cannot constitute the object but is in fact constituted by it. This is the imposition of a “counter-experience” on exper!ence.'’’ “Confronted with the saturated phenomenon, the / cannot not see it, but it cannot look at it like an object, either.””!'® What does the | seer It sees no-thing, no objectifiable given, but is simply dazzled by brilliance, by a paradox.'!’ The paradox sus-

pends the relation of the phenomenon to the I and inverts it, so that the [is constituted by the phenomenon as a me, a witness.!”° Importantly, Marion stresses that this constituting rather than constituted givenness does not necessarily have theological tmplications. It is also of interest in the light of the earlier discussion of Levinas that Marion here refers to the “trace” of the saturated

phenomenon,’ With his “description” of the saturated phenomenon, Marion goes beyond both Husserl and Kant. Yet he main-

tains that the possibility of a giving without reserve is very Husserlian. The saturated phenomenon is a possibility that goes beyond the very conditions of possibility, the possibility of the nnpossible.'”’ [t is readily exemplified in the Cartesian idea of the non remains undefined. Then there 1s a third example, Marion says, a rare case in which there is no horizon and no combination of horizons that can contain

the phenomenon. The ambiguity in Marion's writing on the quesuon of whether or not there is a horizon is hard to resolve. A clearer position seems to emerge in Derrida and Marion, OTG, where Manon observes at p. 66: “T said to Levinas some years ago that im fact the last step for a real phenomenology would be to give up the concept of horizon. Levinas answered me mimediately: “Without horizon there is no phenomenology.” And T boldly assume be was wrong.” This is precisely where he disagrees with Derrida about the nature of phenomenology. NW? Marion, PS, 119-21, For his discussion of modality m £2), see pp. 296-303.

Ns Marion, PS, bt: “Affronté au phénomeénce saturé, le fe ne peut pas ne pas le voir, mais il ne peul pas non plus le regarder comme son objet.” nM" Marion, PS, 121.

> Marion, PS, 121. Marion elsewhere names this “me” “the interlocuted,” or in £D, “the devoted one.” In the latter case the religious imagery 1s striking, and one wonders why Marion has moved to this appellation if he simultaneously wants to distance himself from a univocal reading of the phenomenon. I Manion, PS, 122. iY? Marion, PS, 123-25; ED, 303-5.

BEING GIVEN 145 Infinite, Kant’s sublime, and Husserl’s internal time consciousness, '??

Saturated phenomena are paradoxical insofar as they cannot be anticipated by an intention while being given to intuition. Marion observes four types of paradoxical phenomena, according to the saturation and subversion of each of the four Kantian determinations of quantity, quality, relation, and modality.'*! The historical event saturates the category of quantity.'”® The idol potentially saturates the category of quality.'*° Flesh saturates the

category of relation.'?’? And the icon saturates the category of modality.'** The icon offers nothing to see, but itself “regards.” The I simply becomes a witness of the givenness, It 1s In this context that Marion raises the possibility of the saturated phenome3 Marion, PS. 124-25: ED, 306-9, While Graham Ward considers it in the context of other authors, his analysis of the sublime and its theological implications is very pertinent here. “With Lyotard’s (and Cixous’s}) examimation of the ‘present’ or the ‘event we are brought agam to the theology of the gift and the

economy of mediated immediacy. The moment itself, for Lyotard, is without

content. [tis an encounter with nothingness... consequent upon a certain personal ascess. ... Kari Barth consistently emphasized that revelation was a mediated nnmediacy m which the hidden face of God was revealed.” Graham Ward, Vhealagy and Contemporary Critical Theory Gondon: Macmillan, 1996), 129.

Marion, too, wl make this link with the gift; lrke Ward, hus gift will be situated In a type of economy. 4 Marion, kD 314-17 2 A historical event is something that cannot be limited to an mstant, a place, Or an empirical individual. Marion gives the example of Waterloo, where no one actually “saw” this battle as such. Its possible horizons are infinite in number, ED, 318-19.

"6 The idol stops the gave (and returns it to the viewer like a mirror}. Marion gives the example of the painting, which gwes self without concept. Nevertheless, the idol is different from other saturated phenomena because it provokes solipsism. £D, 319-21. '*" As we find in Levinas, Merleau-Ponty, and Henry, flesh or bodiliness cannot be reduced to consciousness. Manion echoes Henry's work on auto-affection and the absolute experiences of agony, suffering, grief, desire, and orgasm such that

they saturate the horizon. He further specifies bodily experience in two ways:

first, it is unlike the idol but like the historical event, in that it is not about seemg; and second, if is unlike che historical event but like the idol, in that it provokes and demands solipsism. Further, it 1s my affections that make me identical to myself, that give me myself, ED, 321~33. "* The icon contains within it the characterisucs of the three preceding phenomena: 1t encompasses many horizons, it demands revisitation, and it dislodges the transcendental 1. Marion, ED, 324-25.

146 RETHINKING GOD AS GIFF non of the Other, who always precedes me.'*? Now, it is evident that with his discussion of the icon, Marion has moved deliber-

ately to include the possibility of religious phenomena. It is at this pomt that the debate with Janicaud and Derrida becomes very real, and also thal cchoes of Marion's previous work start to become dominam, for his writing on the icon is extensive. The point Marion initially wishes to illustrate is that although the four phenomena named are similar by virtue of their saturation, they vary in degrees of givenness. He then wishes to address the ques-

tion of how far saturation can extend, a question he frames in terms of two conditions: phenomenality and possibility.” Once again pointing out his reservations in linking phenomenology with theology, he argues that the phenomenon that could best achieve these conditions would be the phenomenon of revelatron.’*! [This is primarily because a phenomenon of revelation would give itself as each of the types of saturated phenomenon listed, effectively becoming a fifth “super” type, the paradox of paradoxes: “it saturates phenomenality to the second degree, by saturation of saturation.’''? At the same time, the phenomenon of revelation would always remain just a possibility, which could

be described without the assertion that it had occurred. In fact, that asseruion would lie beyond the bounds of phenomenology. A phenomenon of revelation would define itself as Une possibility of impossibility, where impossibility would not destroy possibility

(as in the case of death), but where possibility would allow for impossibility.? Marion therefore describes his task as considering the possibility of revelation, reframing from the judgment about it that would rest in the realm of revealed theology. 50, he underlines in response to Janicaud, phenomenology and theol4) Marion, iD, 323-24. m0 Marion, A), 326-67. Ty PS, 127, Marion defines revelation phenomenologically as “une apparition purement cde soi et a parur de sor.” ™ Marion, A), 327; ‘elle samre Ja phénoménahté au second cegre, par saturation de saturation.” 33 Marion, ED, 327-28. Cf. Ricoeur, ELDR, 20, where he observes that there can be no single, universal religious phenomenon, but only phenomena incarnated in particular religious traditions. This will be important given Janicaud’s later response to Manon.

BEING GIVEN 147 ogy must remain completely separate disciplines.'* Nevertheless, he uses the manifestation of Jesus Christ as a paradigm of revela-

tory phenomena according to the four modes he has previously outlined. With regard to quantity, Christ is an unanticipatable phenomenon. Marion explores this with regard both to the Incarnation and to texts that refer to the Second Coming. This mects the conditions of the event.’ In relation to quality, the intuition that saturates Christ as phenomenon goes beyond what the phenomenological regard can bear. What cannot be borne is the recogni tion of Christ as such, exemplified in texts such as those referring

to the Transfiguration and fesus’ command not io touch him after the Resurrection. This meets the conditions of the idol.’ From the point of view of relation, Christ appears as an absolute phenomenon because he saturates every horizon. He is not of this world, a point that is reflected in the need for a phurality of titles for Christ, since no single title is adequate. This is a saturation of tT a phénoménologie décrit des possibilités et ne considére jamais le phénoméne de révélation que comme une possibilité de la phénomeénalité, quelle formulerait ainsi: s1 Dieu se manifeste (ou se manifestait), 1 usera dun paradoxe au second degré; la Révélatuion (de Dieu par lui-méme, (héo-logique). si elle

a lieu, prendra la figure phénoménale du phéenomene de révelation, du paradoxe des paradoxes, de la saturation au second degré. Certes, la Revelation (comine etfectivité) ne se confond jamais avec la révélation (comime phenomene possible}—naus respecterons scrupuleusemenet cette difference conceptuclle par sa tracluction graphique. Mats la phenomeénologie, que doit a fa phenomeénalité daller yusqu’a ce point, ne va pas au-dela et ne doit pamiais prerendre décider du fait de la Révélation, 11 de son histonicité, ni de son effectivite,

m de son sens. Elle ne le doit pas, non seulement par souci de distinguer les savoirs et de cdéliniter leurs régions respecuves, mais Cabord parce qu'elle wen a aucuncment les moyens: le fait (siden est un) de la Réevélation excéde Pempan

de toute science, y compris de la phéenoménologie; seule une théologie, ct a condition de se laisser construire a partir de ce fait seul (K. Barth ou H. C. von Balthasar, plus sans doute que R. Bulumann ou K. Rahner) pourrait éventucllementy accéder. Méme si elle en avait le désir (et, bien cniendu, jamais ce ne fret le cas), Ja phénoménologic n’aurait pas la puissance de tourner a la théologie. Ft il faut tout ignorer de la théologie, de ses procédures et de ses problemaliques pour ne fit-ce quenvisager cette Invraisemblance.” Marion, £2), 329 n. 5 Mario, £2), 328-431. "8 Marion. £2, 331. In hes awareness that recognition of Christ as such cannot be borne, Marion scems to be in aceord with the view that recognition comes only after the event, that is, immemortally. Elsewhere Marion descrihes the idol as that which reflects the gaze of the idolater.

148 RETHINKING GOD AS GLET the flesh.'*7 And concerning modality, Marion maintains that Christ constitutes the one who adores him, rather than the other way around. Christ in this way operates iconically. Here we are given examples of Jesus’ inversion of values, particularly in the story of the rich young man. From this story Marion observes two essential traits. One concerns the constituting regard of Jesus, which is given dillerently to each person. His election of persons does not objectity or reify them, but witnesses his love for them. The other trait concerns the redoubling of saturation. Obedience to the commandments, for the rich young man, is a first satura-

tion, and the giving of everything to the poor a second type. Taken together, coming before the regard of Christ means not only doing good in obedience to the law but loving the poor.'* This redoubled saturation meets the conditions of the icon. In Christ, Marion asserts, we have the saturated phenomenon par excellence. The phenomenon of revelation gives itself without re-

serve and without conditions. It is not subject to the need for evidence, for conceptualization, or for the opening of Lreignis. ¥cet there remains the question of the integrity of the relation between Husserlian phenomenology and theology. Marion proposes that Husserl does not put the question of God in brackets:

Husserl brackets only the transcendence of God, reducing God thought as ground.'* From the theological side, is there a contradiction between the idea of the saturated phenomenon of revela-

tion and the tradition of apophatism? What we see in the saturated phenomenon is more the dazzling than a particular spectacle. For example, the face of the Other manifests itself while the regard that looks at me remains invisible: from the point

of view of objectivity, there is nothing to see, but not nothing. Marion submits that it is not a choice between apophatism and kataphatism, but between saturation and the poverty of imtuition.'*°

This brings Marion back to a central question: if the privilege of intuition comes from its character of givenness, how is it possible to explain that givenness is often accomplished without intu2? Marion, ED, 3329-34.

38 Marion, A, 334-35. Io Marion, ED, 335-37. 40 Marion, ED, 337-40.

BEING GIVEN 149 ition? The choice between saturation and poor intuition 1s undecidable. Marion claims to refer to a pure given, both empty and saturated, and he suggests that there are three types of givens such as these. There is the case where givenness gives something inherently non-objectifiable, such as time, or life. These are given without intuition by default. Then there is the case where givenness gives something that is not, such as death. This is given with-

out intuition by definition. The third type is the case where givenness gives something that is not only not entitative, but also not objectifiable, such as my word, peace, or meaning.'*! Here we simply cannot decide between excess and penury. This is given-

ness without intuition by excess, what Marion calls “the abandoned.”''*

AFTER THE SUBJECT

In this chapter I have examined four of the five books of Etant donné with a view to seeing how Marion responds to the critics of Réduction et donation and how his phenomenological enterprise works overall. Evidently, there is a final book to consider, but the place for a complete review of that material, extraordinarily fruitful as it might be, is not here. Instead, I will sketch those areas of

particular interest for the current project and refer the reader to the many discussions of subjectivity that take place elsewhere.!* To maintain an emphasis on the priority of what gives itself to intuition, there has been a corresponding lack of emphasis on the role of that intuition in constituting the given as a phenomenon. But in the final book, Marion turns to contemplate how the self that constitutes is given, a feat of self-reflection that delivers only a minimum to comprehension. The one to whom that constituting self appears is given the names of “witness,” “the assigned”’

or “‘attributary” (“‘Uattributarre’), and “the devoted one” (“ladonné’) by Marion, the last of which has complex and perhaps '4" Marion 1s not unlike Derrida on this point. See Derrida, VR, 27. 2 Marion, £D, 340-42. ‘For example, RED; “The Final Appeal of the Subject,” m Critchley and Dews, DS.

150 RETHINKING GOD AS GIFL unusual connotations in a work that is explicitly non-theological in content. Marion suggests that the aporias that characterize any investiga-

tion of the subject arise because it is the ego or Dasein that is being considered. He argues for a reversal, a substitution of these heures by the altributary who simply receives what is given, inchiding itself. In receiving itself, the attributary is individualized by facticity, not liable to solipsism because submitted to otherness, passive rather than spontaneous because affected rather than cognitively masterful, and liberated from subsistence because unable to become an object. Marion’s subject is a subject without subjectivity.'"' How is this subject constituted? In the giving of phenomena, the attributary is also given: first, as a screen for phenomena,

the “me” who recerves and transforms: and second, as the respondent to a call, in which the attributary itself is transformed into the devoted one.'” Now, what is clearly of interest to us here is the origin of this call. Marion offers three perspectives. Repeating his argument about Heidegger from Réduction et donation,

Marion reinforces that the origin of the call must remain undecidable. He then considers how the call reverses intentionality, along the lines of the Levinasian face. Finally, he makes a connec-

ion between the call and saturated phenomena, which, characterized by an excess of intuition, subverting and preceding any intention, and so behaving counter-intenuionally, make a call not only possible but, he insists, inevitable.''® The call is phenomenologically determined only by the four traits it manifests: convocation, surprise, Interlocution, and facticity.!*” And since the call is always and already given, remains unknown in origin, and 1s only recognizable in the response made, it is like a gift.!¥

The call comes to us as a gift, but as a gift that is necessarily anonymous. It is this feature of anonymity that I wish to emphasize from Marion’s discussion, although I am leaving many other aspects of his brilliant exposition of the subject without subjectivity to one side, The anonymity of the call is protected, he main4 Marion, ED, 360-61,

' Marton, £2, 361-66, Marion, £2), 369.

Marion, £0, 369-73, MY Manion, Fly, 3879-73, 346-97.

BEING GIVEN 15] tains, because there is no specification of the type of saturated phenomenon (or paradox) involved. And in the case of revelation, since it involves not only one but all of the paradoxical types,

it cannot be further specified. What is of great interest is the example Marion chooses: the divme name (YHWH). The name, it seems, is a paradox, which cannot provide access to the divine essence: The voice that reveals, reveals justly because it remains without a voice, More cxactly without a name, but in the Name. The Name only gives in saying without any name, thus completcly. Far [rom

making us fear that such a call drives surreptitiously to name a transcendent nwmen and—badly—to turn to “theology,” we have

to conclude that to the contrary all phenomena of revelation (under the heading of possibility) and especially a Revelauion (under the heading of effectivity) would mmplicate the radical anonymity of that which calis.1™

It is not in calling that the caller is identified, but in the risked response of the devoted one. We note in Marion's discussion of subjectivity not only the influence of Levinas but also that of Ricoeur, whose article in the 1992 collection is instructive.'"" There we find Ricoeur speaking of the (divine) Other as the source of the call: ‘Prayer is turned actively toward this Other by whom consciousness ts affected at the level of feeling. In return, this Other who affects it is perceived as the source of the call to which prayer responds.”'! Later, with reference to the experience of the Jewish people, he also speaks of the Law as the word that is the origin of the call, but Scripture insofar as the legislator 1s absent.’ Or again, with reference to the prophets who speak in the name of YHWH, he observes the coincidence of two voices: God speaks in the response of the one who listens, even though this means that the word is fragile.'*’ Finally, Ricoeur sketches “the retreat of the Name.” “The name of God is at once that which circles between 4" Marton, £410, ™ Not only in ELDR, but in Paul Ricoeur, Oneself Ax Auother, ans. Kathleen Blamey (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1992). ™ Ricoewu, ALDARA, 16; my translation,

™ Ricocur, EEDR, 31. ™ Ricocur, ELDR, 32-33.

152 RETHINKING GOD AS GIFT genres and between scriptures, not belonging to any one, but intersignifying by all,—and also that which escapes from each and from all, in a sign of the non-achievement of all discourse about God.” The question that must be raised at this point in respect to both Marion and Ricoeur is, however, whetber knowing a name is already knowing too much. This difficulty underlies the debate between Marion and Derrida on the gift, as it is recorded in God, the Gift, and Postmodernism. Can the saturated phenomenon give

anything as such, even if its origin cannot be specified? Can the gift be known as such, even in the absence of a specific giver? Does

Marion’s phenomenology require him to have a certain faith? Having examined the complex phenomenological schema of Etant donné, we are now in a better position to consider these questions more closely.

™ Ricoeur, ELDR, 35.

Thee Limits oof Phenomenology RESPONDING ‘10 £YANT DONNE

ETANT DONNE represents an extraordinary achievement, situating

Marion among the foremost thinkers of his generation. Its massive scope, high degree of coherent systematization, and striking and often singular readings of important players in the history of phenomenology mean that it has a significant place in contemporary philosophy. Because of that place, however, we are obliged to enter into debate with Marion concerning the legitimacy of those readings, particularly bearing im mind the quesnons about God, the gift, and phenomenology that motivate this inquiry. It would be unusual, given the tone of Le tournant théologique, if

Dominique Janicaud were not to respond to the responses made to him in Etant donné. This he does in La phénoménologie éclatée.' Here Janicaud raises two main objections: first, that Marion's use

of a capital letter when he speaks of “‘Revelation” seems to suggest that he is not interested merely in the general possibility of revelatory phenomena, but in phenomena in which he has a theological stake; and second, that to isolate such phenomena as ultimate paradoxes would require that their theological truth claims be given consideration, a task that, he asserts, does not belong to

phenomenology. Now, the answer to Janicaud’s question of whether or not Marion 1s interested in revelation or in Revelation is, Once again, yes and no. This equivocation is reflected in the text itself. At one point we have several references to Revelation

(p. 10); at another point we have references to “le phénoméne de révélation” (pp. 327ff.).? I will return to this in a moment. ‘Dominique Janicaud, La phénoménologie éclatée (Combas: Editions de 1’éclat, 1998), * And in the Revue article, RQQ, we have “révélation” (see p. 73).

154 RETHINKING GOD AS GIFT Like Janicaud, Derrida also meets Etant donné with two questions. The first relates to Marion's association of Gegebenhert and gift, which fits in, as a problem, with earlier questioning about the semantic association of gift, given, and givenness. It is a problem also signaled, once again, by Jean Greisch: “The French language would allow us to reassemble under a single hat (that of the magi-

cian} that which the German language does not cease to separate. * Greisch, however, is more forging than Derrida, who observes: Tain not convinced that between the use of Gegebenheit in phenome-

nology and the problem we are about to discuss, that is, the fit, there 1s a semantic continuity, [am not sure that when, of course, Husserl refers, extensively and constantly, to what is given to intulion, this given-ness, this Gegebenfherd has an obvious and intelligible

relationship to the gift, to being given as gift. What we are going to discuss, thatis the gift, perhaps ts not homogenous with Gegebenheit. That is one of the problems with the connection to phenomenology. I will come back to this later on. Now, the way, the mediation or the transition, you made between Gegebenhet in phenomenology

and the es gét in Heidegger ts alsa problematic to me. The way Heidegger refers to the Gabe in the es gr6t is distinct from intuitive Gegebenheit. When Husser] says Gegebenftet, and when phenemenol-

ogists in the broad sense say Gegebenhett, something is given, they refer simply to the passivity of intuition. Something is there. We have, we mect something. Itis there, but it is not a git!

Marion’s response (remembering that here we are in the context of a public debate, conducted in English) is more complex than previously. The first part is as follows: “T disagree with you on the point that givenness, Gegebenheiu, would be restricted for Husserl

io intuition. I would quote some texts and I would suck to that. For him, even significations are given, without intuition. He assumes openly a ‘logical givenness.’ ” Derrida interjects: “"T agree with you. The point was, what is the gift?’’—in response to which Marion reverses his initial position on the equivocity between the cift and givenness: Jean Greisch, ‘Index sui et non dati,” VTransversalités: Reaue de LeInstitut Catholique de Pans 70 (Apyil-June 1999): 27-54, 32, my translation. Prestidigitateur (someone who performs sleight of hand) has been translated as “magician” for the sake of sense in English. ' Derrida and Marion, OTG, 58.

THE LIMITS OF PLIIENOMENOLOGY 155 This is a vood point, and T emphasize 1, because Paul Ricoeur asked me the same question and raised the same objecuion which | myself would sum up as such: Between the givenness, if any, im the phenomenological meaning of the word, and the gift, there is nothing but pure equivocity. / tried to demonstrate the contrary, because to assume thas so-called eqriuocnty as a starting point proves to rmpovertsh both the question of the gift and that of greenness... 1 think of the gilt

as a kind of issue reaching to the most extreme limits, that should be described and be thought and neither explained nor comprehended, but simply thought—in a very radical way. I suggest that, in order to achieve description, 1f any is possible, of the gift, we can be led to open for the first time a new horizon, much wider than those of objecuvity and being, the horizon of givenness."

What we see here is Marton seeking to rely less on a semantic

association between givenness and gift and instead secking, through the question of the gift, to develop the horizon of givenness. This enables him to respond more strongly to Derrida’s subsequent asseruon that for Marion, “every Gegebenheit (is} gift,” and by extension that “everything is a gift, a gilt from God, from whomever,” Marion stresses the reverse: “Every gift (is) Gegeben-

het.” Yet Derrida brings the question back to the nature of phenomenology: “If you say the immanent structure of phenomenality is Gegebenhert, and if by Gegebenheit you refer to something

given, to some common root, then every phenomenon is a gift. Even if you do not determine the giver as God, it is a gift. I am not sure that this is reconcilable or congruent with what I know under the name of phenomenology.’’* What exactly does Derrida

mean by “some common root’? Does he mean to include the given with Gegebenheit, and thereby imply that the link between these two words is inappropriate? Or does he interpret the given by “common root” with the gift (a given is a gift, rather than a fact}? There is no clear answer here. Instead, we will progress further if we consider the second issue he raises in this last paragraph, which is what might legitimately go ‘‘under the name of phenomenology.” The real issue for Derrida is this: * Derrida and Marion, OTG, 61; emphasis added,

"Dernda and Marion, OG, 71,

156 RETHINKING GOD AS GIFT What I understand as phenomenology, the principle of all principles, which you have recalled here, implies finally intuition, that is, the fullness of the intuition, the presence of something. When there 1s a gap between intuition and intention, there is a crisis, there 1s a symbolic structure. But the principle of all principles is intuition. If you agree, as I think you agree, about the impossibility of equating the gift to a present, then you cannot define every phenomenon as gift. That is what puzzles me.’

What Marion and Derrida are really debating, albeit contextualized by the problem of the gift, is the nature and limits of phenomenology. For Derrida, as we have seen, phenomenology is about presence, and where it fails to bring into presence it fails as a methodology, For Marion, phenomenology is also about presence, but without that presence equating to the fullness of intuition, For Derrida givenness equals presence, whereas for Marion givenness may cqual presence, but not in the sense of present to intuition. By way of an argument over semantics, the question once again becomes; “Can there be a given that docs not deliver itself in presence to intuition?” —and only then can we ask: ‘‘Can there be a pift?” While coming from a different angle, Derrida leads us in the end to the same point as Janicaud, whose critique I will now address. We saw earlier how Marion’s thought of givenness could be situated in the theological trajectory of his previous works. Yet it was also evident that in Réduction et donation Marion was produc-

ing a work of phenomenology, not theology. In Etant donné, as I have indicated, Marion similarly argues that his task is strictly phenomenological. Nevertheless, in the latter work we find Marion examining phenomena of revelation/ Revelation and arguing that this examination is within the realm of possibility for phenomenology. It scems feasible to understand, then, that Marion sees phenomenology as a sort of prolegomena for theology. I do not mean by this that he tries to deduce revealed theology from phenomenological method, an undertaking that he would find unquestionably abhorrent, although this possibility is suggested 7 Derrida and Marion, OTG, 71.

THE LIMITS OF PHENOMENOLOGY 157 by Vincent Holzer.* Instead, I am proposing that Marion seeks the enlargement of phenomenology to include the possibility, rather than the actuality, of something like theology, based on the point

that revelatory phenomena cannot simply be excluded from the limits of phenomenological investigation. That being said, 1t cannot be ignored that to complete this enlargement, Marion has to give examples, and the examples he chooses are from Christian tradition. The problems Janicaud identifies reduce to this: if phenomenology is to include revelatory phenomena, it must presumably be able to point to examples of such phenomena, even if it is to illustrate the possibility, rather than the actuality, of revelation. But as soon as examples are identified, the question arises as to whether they are what it is they are claimed to be: revelatory phenomena. There is in the exemplification always a necessary shift from phenomena of revelation to phenomena (or better, the phenomenon) of Revelation. If Marion were to add examples of revelation from other religious traditions, there would be no less of a problem, for the issue 1s in the naming itself. A phenomenon of revelation must reveal something; it is therefore invested with the power to Reveal. If, on the other hand, and here | go beyond Janicaud, I were confronted with a saturated phenomenon such as Marion describes, I would have to be able to put to one side the question of whether or not it was a phenomenon of revelation in order to preserve its very quality of saturation. The disposition Marion seeks to assume here is that of the dispassionate observer, the phenomenologist of religion, perhaps, who 1s able to stand back and describe what religious traditions refer to by “phenom-

ena of revelation.”’ Keeping this In mind, it seems what he achieves in Etant donné is legitimate. But Marion is not cataloging

what others say is revelatory; on the contrary, he is asking us to contemplate that when someone bears witness to a revelatory phenomenon, it might actually be Revelatory. To describe something as revelatory involves a commitment in advance, not to the possi"Cf. the comments of Vincent Holzer in “Phénoménologie radicale et phénoméne de révélation. Jean-Luc Marion, tant donné. Essai d'une phénoménologie de la donation,” Transversalités: Revue de L’Institut Catholique de Pans 70 (AprilJune 1999): 55-68, 66-68 [hereafter Holzer, PRPR]. * Bearing in mind the injunction of Paul Ricoeur in ELDR, 20.

158 RETHINKING GOD AS GIFI bility of revelation, but to its actuality.!” For this reason, Janicaud is correct Lo point out that Marion exceeds the limits of phenomenology.

It seems that we have reached an impasse, one that was suggested im the examination of Réduction et donation and which has now been confirmed by Ftant donné. Phenomenology cannot deliver phenomena of revelation/Revelation as such, and therefore

it scems that the conversation between phenomenvlogy and theology cannot take place, at least not without doing violence to the neutral (as distinct from the natural) attitude of phenomenology. From a Derridean point of view, this is because revelatory phenomena would have to be delivered in presence, a requirement that would undo any possible revelatory quality they might have. Like the gift, a God handed over into intellectual custody would be no God at all. And from Janicaud’s point of view, the impossi-

bility of delivering phenomena of revelation stems from the requirement that phenomenology observe what appears to consciousness without involving a leap of faith. It could, of course, be

argued in response that phenomenology always involves such a leap, for as Derrida has shown, there is no phenomenology without a tacit hermeneutics. Marion falls somewhere in between these positions, His desire is to reformulate phenomenology, but in accordance with its inherent Ifusserlian possibilities, where it can examine what is more than an object but less than an intuited presence. But on both counts, it is the hermeneutical dimension that can be called into question. If what gives itself is not an object and is not present, what does it mean? At the same time, it would be foolish to discount what Marton is trying to do, namely, to find a way of thinking what is greater than thought. This is the basis of the attracniveness of his work to theology.

In one sense, it is very difficult to prove that what Marion 1s doing Is not phenomenology but working al the point of phenomenology’s failure. I say that because in the debate with Derrida at Villanova, as well as in the fine print of Etant donné, definitions make all the ditference. For example, where Marion uses the language of horizon it seems he is stuck in a metaphysics of presence. But then he redefines presence, and renounces the horizon, and Holzer, PRPR, 58.

THE LIMITS OF PHENOMENOLOGY 159

is even prepared to go so far as to say that “as to the question of whether what I am doing, or what Derrida is doing, is within phenomenology or beyond, it does not seem to me yery important.” In other words, it all depends on how the limits of phenomenology are described. The way to judge the success of Marion’s work is instead to focus on its hermeneutical dimension.

To what extent are those phenomena that, according to his schema, resist presence-to-intuivion reinscribed in metaphysics by

way of hermeneutics, or can they resist being solely tied to the particular hermeneutical approach that is Christianity? The breakdown of classical phenomenology occurs at the point where what is given exceeds conscious thematization, and we see

this in a negative way thanks to Janicaud, because he indicates that any decisive reading of what surpasses intelligibility requires a leap of faith. We observe the breakdown more positively in the work of Levinas, where keeping faith with phenomenology is less

of an issue insofar as the failure is concomitant with living, as distinct from merely thinking. But with Levinas—and more especially the later Levinas, where a number of difficulties concerning

the Other have been resolved—the leap of faith is recognized without our having to commit to 1t. This is what distinguishes him

from Marion, at least to the extent that identifying a saturated phenomenon as revelatory in the sense in which Marion uses the word involves making a judgment about its origin. Yet it is not so

much the making of a judgment that is the problem. The diffculty occurs when the judgment is passed off as pure description. Now, it seems to me that Marion’s thinking of saturated phenomena provides him with an opportunity to describe the conditions

surrounding what interrupts or exceeds consciousness, without his having to take the next step of committing to an interpreta-

tion of that interruption. Prescinding from the question of whether or not a phenomenon is revelatory, how are we to deal with it if it overruns consciousness either by excess (Marion) or by aridity (Derrida)? If it is possible to locate such “phenomena” in general, is it possible to approach phenomena from a religious tradition (a text, for example) and without presuming to describe them as revelatory, to investigate their potentiality for saturation? ' Derrida and Marion, OFG, 68. Marion renounces the horizon at 66.

160 RETHINKING COD AS GIFT It seems to me that this ts a valid path to take. That being the case, let us examine how Marion reads such phenomena, using the example of the icon. THE Icon

Many sources in Marton’s work provide access to his thinking of the icon. As early as L idole et la distance, he is developing a theme

that will become his trademark: icon versus idol. It appears con-

stantly in articles and books up to and including Etant donné.' Since Marion himself uses the icon as an example of a saturated phenomenon in this last text, it provides an ideal study in the present context. Nevertheless, [ will also draw from his theological works in illustrating how the icon functions, especially in relation to the idol. In L idole et la distance, the idol is characterized not as the per-

sonification of its god but as the image by means of which the worshiper is referred only to the human experience of divinity.” The icon, in contrast, is characterized as that which works as a kind of negative theophany.'* Where Paul names Christ the “icon of the invisible God,” Marion explains, God the Father does not lose invisibility so much as become visible in transcendence.'® ™ For example, /D; “La double idolatnie: Remarques sur la différence ontologique et la pensée de Dicu,” Heidegger et fa question de Dieu, cd. Richard Kearney and Joseph S. O'Leary (Paris: Grasset, 1980}, 46-74; “La vanité d’étre et le nom de Dieu.” Analogre ef dialectique: Esseis de théologie fondamentale, ed. P. Gisel and Ph. Secretan (Geneva: Labor et Fides, 1982), 17-49: Drew sans Uatre: Hors-texte (1982; Paris: Quadrige/Presses Universitaires de France, 1991), trans. as GWB; “De la ‘mori de diew’ aux noms divins: L’itinéraire théologique de la métaphysique, Laval théalogique et philosophaique 41, no, 1 (1985): 25-41, and L ¢tre et Drew (Paris: Cerf, 1986); Prolégoménes a in chanté, 2nd ed, (Paris: Editions de la Différence, 1991) [hereafter Marion, PC], CV; ED. 'S Marion, (2, 19-22. '§ Marion, ID, 24.

Marion, (D>, 23: “La profomdeur du visage vistble du Fils livre au regard Vinvisibilité du Pére comme teile. L’tcéne ne manifeste ni le visage human, ni la nature divine que nul ne saurail envisager, mais, clisaient les théologiens de

Picéne, le rapport de Pune a Vautre dans lhypostase, la personne.” (‘The depth of the vistble face of the Son lets the invisibility of the Father be seen as such. The tcon manifests neither the human face, nor the divine nature that no one would be able to envisage, but, theologians of the icon would say, the relationship of the one to the other in the hypostasis, the person.’’)

THE LIMITS OF PHENOMENOLOGY 161 While the idol is about preserving the proximity of the divine, the icon manifests distance.'® Concepts, too, can function idolatrously or iconically. Therefore Marion is able to understand the Nietzschean ‘“‘death of God” in terms of the death only of an idolatrous concept of God.'” Yet words can also refer, he maintains, to the unspeakable.'* Where theology has been practiced as onto-theology, the conceptual idols of metaphysics are rightly condemned." But where theology preserves “distance,” where it allows for the

divine to overflow what is merely human, it goes beyond idolatry.*°

Marion’s understanding of how idols and icons function is deepened in God Without Being. Here he perceives that the differ-

ence between them lies in their “manner of being for beings” rather than in their being two classes of beings. This is because frequently the same object can function as an idol or an icon. But either way it is a question of veneration, and an object is venerated when it is seen as a sign of the divine.*! Artistic works are so venerated when “‘they no longer restrict their visibility to themselves... but, as such and by thus remaining absolutely immanent

in themselves, ... they signal indissolubly toward another, still undetermined term.” It is in this referring that the value of the '’ Marion, /D, 23-24. Here Marion’s thought reminds us of Balthasar. 7 Marion, /D, 15-16, 45ff. This is affirmed once again in GWB, chapter 2. '® Marion, JD, 24: “le concept ne pourrait-il pas jouer, aussi et d’abord, comme une icéne, au sens ot, comme licéne offre la figure de l’invisible, ‘les mots ne sont pas la traduction d’autre chose qui était la avant eux’ (L. Wittgenstein), mais la profération méme de ce qui demeure au méme instant a4 jamais indict-

ble.” (“could not the concept play, also and firstly, as an icon, in the sense where, as an icon offers the figure of the invisible, ‘words are not the translation of anything else which was there before them’ (L. Wittgenstein), but the very utterance of that which remains at the same time forever unspeakable. ’’) '? Marion explores Western metaphysical idolatry in GWB, 16, where, he suggests, God is made idol as causa suz and as source of morality: “The concept consigns to a sign what at first the mind grasps with it (concepere, capare); but such a grasp is measured not so much by the amplitude of the divine as by the scope of a capacitas, which can fix the divine in a specific concept only at the

moment when a conception of the divine fills it, hence appeases, stops, and freezes it. When a philosophical thought expresses a concept of what it then names ‘God,’ this concept functions exactly as an idol.” “o Marion, 1D, 24-42. “Il Marion, GWB, 7-8. “ Marion, GW8, 8.

162 RETHINKING GOD AS GIFT work resides; it is the mode of signaling that will determine the difference between the idol and the icon.” An idol is not an illusion: it consists precisely in being seen, in

becoming an object of knowledge. “The idol depends on the gaze that it salishes, since if the gaze did not desire to satisfy itself in the idol, the idol would have no dignity for it.”*? Hence itis not in the fabrication of the idol that its venerability resides,

but in tts consideration by the gaze. The intention of the gaze aims at the divine, but it is stopped there. Prior to being arrested by the idol, the gaze sees nothing that will satisfy tt. But in the face of the idol, what Marion calls “the first visible,’ the gaze allows itself to be filled, to be dazzled. At the same time, in the ido] the gaze discovers its own limit, The idol acts as a mirror

that reflects “the image of its aim and... the scope of that aim.’** Yet the mirror effect remains secondary to the spectacle liself, and so remains invisible. In this way the emptiness of idolairy is never exposed to the idolater. The mirror function of the idol is an essential feature, since it indicates not only the extent of the aim of the gaze but also what the gaze cannot see lor being blocked by the idol. The gaze cannot be critical, but rests 1 the idol, incapable of going beyond it." ‘“lhe invisible mirror thus marks, negatively, the shortcoming of the aim—literally, the wv sable.”’** In the idol we see the divine, but only according to the measure of our own gaze.” Marion evaluates the idol in terms of this measure: “it represents nothing, but presents a certain lowwater mark of the divine; it resembles what the human gaze has

experienced of the divine.’ The idol itself does not reproduce the god, but only fixes in stone what the gaze has seen of the god, “the poimt marked by the frozen gaze.’’*’ It is the emotion “Manon, GWB, 8-9. “Variations in the mode of visibility indicate variations in the mode of apprehension of the divine itself.” GWE, 9. “I Manion, GWB, 10. “° Manion, GWB, 11-12.

“’ Manion, GWB, 11-12. “The idol would not be disqualified thus, vis-a-vis a revelation, not at all because it would offer to the gaze an illegitimate spectacle, but first because 1 suggests to the gaze where to rest (itself). GWB, 13. “" Manon, GWB, 13. ** Marion, GWB, 13-14. 29 Marion, GWE, 14.

*° Marion, GW, I.

THE LIMITS OF PHENOMENOLOGY 163

of this initial fixing that is represented in the idol and which fixes others.*!

“The icon does not result from a vision but provokes one.” Contrary to the idol, the icon allows the visible to become saturated by the invisible, without the invisible being reduced in any way to the visible.’ The invisible is unenvisageable. It is represented in the visible only insofar as the visible constantly refers to

what is other than itself. It retrains the gaze.“ Yet how can the invisible become visible in the icon at all? Marion distinguishes between God’s presence as substantial (referring to the Greek ousia, substance, which he associates with metaphysics) and God's presence as personal (using the Greek hupostasis or the Latin persona). “ Hupostasis,.. docs not imply any substantial presence; ...

the persona attested its presence only by that which itself most properly characterizes it, the aim of an intention . . . that a gaze sets in operation. “® Marion defines the icon, like the idol, in terms of the gaze, but here he is concerned with the gaze of the invisible rather than the gaze of the human. “The icon regards us—il concerns US, IN that W allows the intention of the invisible to

occur visibly.”"" The icon shows us a face that opens on the infinite.” It does not act 45 a mirror, but overwhelms us. “In the idol,

the gaze of man is frozen in its mirror; m the icon, the gaze of man is lostin the invisible gaze that visibly envisages him.’’** Invisi“The idol consigns and couserves in its material the brilliance where the gaze froze, in the expectation that other eyes will acknowledge the brilliance of a first visible that freezes them in their material scope.” Marion, GWR, 15. * Marion, GWB, 17.

"The visible [proceeds] from the invisible. ... [T}he invisible bestow[s] the visible.” Marion, GWB, 17.

“The icon summons the gaze to surpass itself by never freezing on a visible, since the visible only presents itself here in view of the invisible.” Marion, GWB, 18.

“ Marion, GWB, 18-19.

“ Marion, GWB, 19. This “being envisaged” 1s characterisuc of Balthasar’s theology. See Hans Urs von Balthasar, The Glory of the Lord, vol. 7, Theology: The New Covenant, trans. Brian McNeil, C.R.V. (San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 1989),

286-87 [hereafter Balthasar, G/.7].

“The icon alone offers an open face, because it opens in itself the visible onto the invisible, by offering its spectacle to be transgressed—not to be seen, but to be venerated.” Manion, CWB, 19. It 1s possible to trace here something of Levinas’s influence on Marion. Marion, GWA, 20.

164 RETHINKING GOD AS GIFT bility is made visible in the face; the infinite gives itself in the icon." Infinite intention, it is excessive, abyssal, overflowing the capacity of the human gaze. It seems that in the face of the icon, the infinite passes.” The intention from beyond the icon substitutes itself for the human intention. Further, the human face then also serves as a mirror to reflect divine glory." The concept can function as an icon as easily as an idol, but to function in this way requires that “the concept renounce compre-

hending the incomprehensible, to attempt to conceive it, hence also to recetve it, in its own excessiveness.’” Is it possible to have such a concept? ‘The only concept that can serve as an intelligible medium for the icon is one that lets itself be measured by the

excessiveness of the invisible that enters into visibility through infinite depth.’ Marion suggests that the Cartesian idea of the Infinite might act in this way." The concept determines an inten“The icon 1s defined by an origin without original: an origin itself infinite, which pours itself out or gives itself throughout the infinite depth of the icon.” Marion, GWB, 20.

” Again we are reminded of Levinas: “the icon pamted on wood does not come from the hand of a man but from the infinite depth that crosses it—or better, orients it following the intention of a gaze.’ Marion, GWB, 21. "The invisible summons us, ‘face to face, person to person’ () Cor. 13:12), through the painted visibility of its incarnation and the factual visibility of our Mesh: no longer the visible idol as the invisible mirror of our gaze, but our face as the visible mirror of the invisible.” Marion, GWB, 22. Marion, GW#H, 22. 8 Marion, GWB, 23.

“ Note the influence of Levinas once again. In the Sorbonne interview, Mar10n speaks of the significance of the idea of the infinite and the role it plays in Levinas, revealing some interesting and highly pertinent thoughts on the hor: zon: “It would be possible to think God as the infinite, on the condition that it is a positive infinity and non-objective, that 1t not be spoken of as a representation—that is what Levinas says. Me, I will say that it 1s necessarv that the infinite appears as a horizon more than a phenomenon, or rather—hecause a horizon limits, by definition—it 1s a non-horizon, it is that which 1s always beyond the horizon, that which is the greatest thing of which we can think (Anselm)—this is Anselm's definition. a non-cdefinition. Thus the idea of the infinite is only possible as a non-definition of God. ... [I]t is a concept of that which is indefinable. It is a precise concept of that which goes beyond all definition. It is that which is interesting in the concept of the infinite. Thus . . . for Levinas, the idea of the infinite ts an intentionality which goes beyond all objects. It 1s an intentionality without objects, the infinite. And that is why he applics the infinite not to God but to the face in general, because the face in general is that which IS infinite, and infinite mm the sense that there 1s no object... . The infinite means that which 1s greater than we can think.” Marton discusses both Anselm's

THE LIMITS OF PHENOMENOLOGY 165 tion, not an essence. In the iconic concept, the distance between the visible and the invisible is assured. In La croisée du visible, a collection of four essays, Marion focuses

on the iconic function of art.4° The first essay, “La croisée du visible et de invisible,” moves from a consideration of art in general to the special and distinctive case of the icon, where it 1s necessary to go beyond both objectivity and perspective in favor of fostering a new relationship between the visible and the invisible. In the icon, the invisible is zn the visible. The icon offers itself

to the gaze without setting perspective in motion.” It shows Its own gaze to the face of the faithful person who prays before it, so that two invisible regards cross. The icon accomplishes both the insertion of the invisible in the visible and the subversion of the visible by the invisible." “The invisible exercises itself as the look itself, which looks invisibly at another invisible regard, by the intermediary of a painted visible . . . it results in a less classic phe-

nomenological situation. where intentionality no longer accomplishes itself as an objectivity, indeed accomplishes the putting in question of ils own status as an [°°* definition and Descartes’s idea of the infinite in his Questrans cartéseennes, 2 vols. (Paris: Presses Universitaires de France, 1991, 1996) [hereafter Marion, OCfand OCH]. With regard to Levinas, see OCI, 45, 245. At the latter page Marion refers

us lo Levinas’s short piece “Sur Videc de Vinfint en nous,” which appears in Entre nous: Essais sur le penser-d-Cautre (1991; Paris: Livre de Poche, 1993), 22 7-30;

this is now available as /enére Nous: On Thinking-of-the-Other, trans. Michael B. Smith and Barbara Harshav (New York: Columbia University Press, 1998). With regard to the idea of the infinite, see OCH, 245ff. and 275-79. With regard to Anselm and God as concept, see QCT, 221-58. % Marion, CY.

" Marion, CV, 41: “Péconomie de Picéne ne dépend pas de Vinvestissement de espace par Vinvisible; Vinvisible y uent en effet un réle plus fondamental que celui d’organiser espace, en simple chorége du visible. L'invisible joue ailleurs et autrement.” (‘the economy [is 1tan accident that he uses this word? | of the icon does not depend on the mvestment of space by the iivisible; the Invisible holds there in effect a role more fundamental than that of organizing space, as a simple ‘conductor’ of the visible. The invisible plays elsewhere and otherwise."’) “ Marion, CV, 42-453, * Marion, CY, 45: “Vinvisible s’exerce comme le regard lui-méme, qui regarde

invisiblement un autre regard invisible, par Pintermédiaire dun visible peint... len résulte une situation phénoménologique moins classique, ot: intentionnalité ne s'accomplhit plus cn une objectivité, voire accomplit la mise en cause de son propre statut cle /e.”

166 RETHINKING GOD AS GIFT “Ce que cela donne,” the next essay, is concerned with how a painter is able to make something of the invisible visible in what

Marion calls Jinwu (“the unseen”). “Linvu is not seen, in the same way that the unheard of is not heard, the unknown is not known... . Liinvu certainly belongs to the invisible, but does not merge with it, since it can transgress it precisely in becoming visible: ... finvu, only provisionally invisible, exerts all its demands

of visibility in order to, sometimes by force, burst into the visible.” Linvu gives the painting a certain independence, a powerfulness that does not reside in visibility alone. It opens us up to desire for what cannot have been foreseen. The painting itself teaches us to see. And either it will act as an idol, giving us nothing more than our own projections (which results in a crisis of the visible), or it will witness to the unseen, to depth and to glory. In this way it will be a gift for vision.** Marion comments, and not without some significance: “To see is to receive, since to appear is tO give oneself to be seen.’”*' The given demands reception.” The third essay, “L’aveugle a Siloé,”’ addresses the question of the image versus the original.®* The original may be consigned to invisibility, but this invisibility is not simply a denial of its reality.*4

The original is defined by its invisibility, by the fact that it cannot be reduced to an image. Among his examples, Marion refers to the case of the cube, which cannot be seen “as such.” ‘The distance between perception and knowledge requires active reconslitution of the cube as an object. The invisible remains invisible, but 1s confirmed by the increase of the visible.** Marion also gives * Marion, CVS): “L/inva n'est pas vu, tout comme Vinoui n'est pas entendu, Vinsu nest pas su.... Linvu reléve certes de Vinvisible, mais ne se confond pas

avec lu, piusquwil peut le transgresser cn devenant précisement visible... Pinvu, invisible seulement provisoire, exerce toute son exigence de visibilité pour, parfois cle force, y faire rrruption.”’ " Marion, CV, 57-81, | Marion, CV, 80: “Voir, c est recevoir, puisquapparaitre c'est (se) domner a Vorr.””

™ Marion, CV, &l. We cannot but be reminded of Balthasar. ™ Marion observes how INMECS Operate li) contemporary society, and the way

that perception becomes everyuning. Frequently, the image destroys the original. Marton, CY, 85-98.

“Ttis hard not to imagine this in somewhat Platonic fashion, although | am sure that this is not what Marion means. * Marion, CY, 99-101.

THE LIMITS OF PHENOMENOLOGY 167 the example of the irreducibility of the face. In the case of a lover,

“that which someone wants to see does not coincide with that which the face gives to be seen to every other regard."*" Once again, it is the weight of the other’s regard that is glimpsed. “I do not see the visible face of the other, [as an] object still reducible

to an image ... but the invisible regard that swells up from the obscure pupils of the other; in short, I see the other of the visible face.”’*’ In love, therefore, Iam no longer bound to the image.” The two examples I have just quoted from Marion serve lo support strongly his argument that invisibility and reality are not mu-

tually exclusive. We are thus prepared for a denouement of the theological implications of the study. Christ as icon ts a further— and, he will add, superlative—example of visibility referring us to invisibility:

Christ offers an icon to the regard only in manifesting a face, that is to say a look, itself invisible. It is therefore a matter, in the frst place, of a crossing of regards, as it 1s for lovers: I look, with my invisible look, at an invisible look that envisages me; in the icon, 1 effect, il is not so much me who sees a spectacle as much as an other regard that sustains mine, confronts it, and eventually, overwhelms it. But Christ does not only offer to my regard to see and to be seen by his [regard]; if he demands from me a love, it 1s not a love for him, but for his Father. ... But since the Father remains invisible, how am I able to see the Father in secing Christ? Would not Ghrist constitute only what can be seen of the Father in the place of the Father, that which holds visibly the place of the invisibility of the Father?” Marion, CV, Ld: “ce gull veut voir ne coincide pas avec ce que ce visage donne a voir ad tout autre regard.” ~ Marion, CV, 102: “Je ne vois pas le visible visage de l'autre, objet encore réductible a une unage ... mais le regaret invisible qui sourd des obscures pupilles de Pautre visage; bref, jo vols Pautre du visible visage.” This 1s a very useful reading of Levinas on the face. "* Marion, ©b, 102.

™ Marion, CY, 103: “Le Christ n’oftre au regard une icéne qu’en manifestant un visage, Cesta-t Derrida, GD, 96.

RETHINKING THE GIFT I 219 circle of reckoning, from which Abraham could only momentarily escape. If there is gift, then it is only in the moment of madness, and never mi the circle as such.

Another way of reading this sacrifice would be in the light of Jesus’ teaching, and Derrida offers us scope for such a reading in the following chapter. He refers to the saying that when giving

alms, the right hand should not know what the left hand 1s doing.” According to Derrida, the economics inscribed in the Gospels “integrates absolute loss.” The vengeance that ts rightfully exacted under Mosaic law (an eye for an eye) is suspended with the commandment to turn the other cheek. ‘Does this commandment reconstitute the parity of the pair rather than breaking it up, as we just suggested: No, it doesn’t, it interrupts the parity and symmetry, for instead of paying back the slap on the

cheek... one is to offer the other cheek.” Once again, in Abraham's sacrifice we are referred to love, Derrida defines sacrifice as “the putting to death of the unique, irreplaceable, and most precious.” It refers, he says, to “the impossibility of substitution.”*? This theme is developed in the dis-

cussion of love and hate. Apparent opposites are destabilized. Sacrifice is not the hate of enemies, but the hate of loved ones. Love must become hate to be love. “Hate cannot be hate, It can only be the sacrifice of love to love.” Derrida (and Kierkegaard) cite Luke 14:26 in support of this reading. We cannot be disciples

of Jesus without hating what is closest to us. Perhaps we could also refer to the other inversion that characterizes Jesus’ ministry, which is the command to love our enemies (Matt. 5:43-—48). We must love what we hate and hate what we love. Yet it may be more appropriate to speak in both cases of a subversion rather than an inversion. Jesus does not simply invert values or beliefs, but actu“Tf this spuidualization of the ‘interior light institutes a new cconomy (an economy of sacrifice: vou will receive good wages you rise above earthly gain, you will get a better salary if you give up your earthly salary, one salary is waged

against another), then it is by breaking with, dissociaung from, or rendermg dissymmetrical whatever 1s paired with the sensible body, in the same way that tt means breaking with exchange as a sumple form of reciprocity.” Derrida, GD, 101.

* Derrida, GD, 102. ? Derrida, GD, o8. “ Derrida, GD, 64.

220 RETHINKING GOD AS GIET ally reorients both them and their opposites. For example, when Jesus washes the feet of the disciples he does not simply substitute the role of master for the role of servant, but redefines leadership in terms of an outpouring of love. So the first way in which Derrida uses “the gift of death” is in the sense of sacrifice, a sacrifice of what is most important, and even a sacrifice of oppositions. The second way also involves a type of sacrifice, but it is a sacrifice not of love but of knowledge. Death is something that cannot be experienced, at Jeast in the terms that make it viable to speak of experience at all. Death ar-

rives, but not m the sense that it “happens” to me.*” For this reason, death remains always in the future, and it is a useful tool for Derrida to use when he tries to speak about that which cannot be present. Reading Kierkegaard (and so not necessarily making a statement of personal faith), Derrida dwells for some time on the “‘ex-

perience’ of God as one of fear and trembling. It is the “experience” of the mystenum tremendum, known only in the trembling that is the trace of its passing. Trembling is a response to a shock, the origin of which we cannot see. But trembling is

also the anticipation of the unpredictable repetition of that shock. As Derrida suggests, “We tremble in that strange repetition that ties an irrefutable past (a shock has been felt, a trauma-

tism has already affected us) to a future that cannot be anticipated.” Trembling forms the trace of a double secret, a secret that is kept intact via the two dimensions that deprive us of experience. The past dimension is immemorial—that is, the se-

cret has always already passed by the time we respond to it in trembling. The future dimension remains always just bevond the horizon—that is, the secret can only be anticipated to the extent that 1t remains utterly unforeseeable. Nevertheless, we are told that the secret is the mysterzum tremendum. That which makes us

tremble is “the gift of infinite love, the dissymmetry that exists between the divine regard that sees me, and myself, who doesn't see what is looking at me; it is the gift and endurance of death In French the word arrver can be used to mean both “to arrive” and “to happen.” " Derrida, GD, 54.

RETHINKING THE GUFT If 221 that exists in the irreplaceable, the disproportion between the infinite gift and my finitude, responsibility as culpability, sin, salvation, repentance, and sacrifice.’""! This material evidently opens

onto the questions of the secret, of the call, and of God, but a discussion of these questions will be momentarily deferred, What does Derrida mean by a “gift and endurance of death’? Perhaps it is that if there were to be an “experience” of God, it could only be an experience that dehed knowledge, a gift or endurance of a death. In the same way that death excludes our consciousness of it, God’s passing would be so foreign as to be irreducible. Another, related way in which we might understand “the gift of death” is as the putting of oneself to death. This can be thought of as a movement of faith. Elsewhere, Derrida describes faith as a surrendering to the witness of the wholly other. Faith is a surrender to witness rather than to knowledge as such. Further, we can consider the gift of death from the point of view of responsibility. It was mentioned earlier that Abraham's response and responst-

bility to God comes at the price of an ethics that nevertheless remains intact. Abraham demonstrates his complete obedience to God; he responds in responsibiluy to the Absolute Other. But in responding to the Absolute Other, he has necessarily suspended his duty to all the other others. [le has suspended his duty of protection toward his son, he has suspended his duty of trust toward his wife, and he has suspended his duty to behave ethically in society. Entering into relationship with and fulfilling my duties with regard to one other, or in this case the Absolute Other, means that my duties to every other other are somehow compromised. The one starving person whom I am able to feed stands beside all those others whom I am not able to feed. And in

a certain sense, because I have chosen to feed this one, I have chosen not to feed the others. I have given them death. “As soon as | enter into relationship with the other, I know that I can respond only by sacrificing ethics, that is, by sacrificing whatever obliges me to also respond, in the same way, in the same instant, to all the others. [ offer a gift of death, I betray, I don’t need to raise my knife over my son on Mount Moriah for that,’ Death “! Derrida, GD, 55-56. Derrida, &S, 40; FA, 35. 3 Derrida, GD, 68.

222 RETUINKING GOD AS GIFT can be thought of as that which is dealt to us (perhaps causally, but without origin) or as something (no-thing) I deal to others. In either case, since death is another variant of the moment of madness, it meets the criteria of the gift. The Call, the Secret, and Perhaps God

It will be remembered that “the call’ is an insistent theme in the writing of Heidegger (the call of Being), Levinas (the call of the Other), and Marion (the call beyond Being). But how does Derrida think the call? Is the call a call that is made in secret? And is it possible, with certain provisos in place, to think nevertheless a secret call of God, or to think God as a secret, a gift in secret? I must immediately make the observation, however, that Derrida

only infrequently makes of the call a theme to be explored as such. In fact, there 1s in Derrida, as in Levinas, far more attention

devoted to response rather than call. But there are a number of places where it will at least be evident that the question of call, especially insofar as 11 demands a response, is one of Derrida’s preoccupations. “Whence comes the law that obligates one to give even as one renders an account of the gift? In other words, to answer [répondre] sull for a gift that calls one beyond all responsibility?’ This short passage from Given Time registers in several keys at once. It refers us to Kant, to the categorical imperative that orders us to our one duty, and which elsewhere Derrida will expose in its impossibility.” It then refers us to the call as a call to an impossible responsibility (the responsibility “beyond all responsibility’). And it refers us to the call of the gift, to the gift as call, without specifying the gift any further, and with such an association reinforcing the idea that what is demanded in the call is impossible. If we turn to ‘‘Passions,” we find that the call is related to the

invitation, and both call and invitation are related to the response. “What we are glimpsing of the invitation (but of the call m general, as well) governs by the same ‘token’ the logic of the “Derrida, GY, Al. “See Jacques Derrida, “Passions,” trans. David Wood, in Qn the Name, ed. Thomas Dutoit (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1995), 3-31, at 7-8 [hereatter Derrida, Pass]; and Derrida, GD, 77.

RETHINKING THE GIFT II 225 response, both of the response to the invitation and the response by itself." Yet responsibility and invitation are aporetic in structure, provoking an interruption to any logic. And in that aporta, where it is impossible to move, “it is not only religious sociality whose identity is thus menaced, it is philosophical sociahty, insofar as it presupposes the order (preferably circular) of the appeal

for the call: appel—Tr.], of the question and the response.” What does Derrida mean by the presupposition of a “preferably circular” order? It seems to me that those discourses which are governed by the form of question and response, of knowledge (a circular order, an economy), are interrupted insofar as question and response will always lead to the aporia. The presupposition of the order of the appeal is overrun by the appeal. Further on in the same essay, we learn that there 1s a call associ-

ated with the secret: “When it is the call [@ppef] of this secret, however, which points back to the other or to something else, when it is this itself which keeps our passion aroused, and holds us to the other, then the secret impassions us." Yet the secret calls without speaking. “And the secret will remain secret, mute, impassive as the khéra. ... [t remains silent, not to keep a word in reserve or withdrawn, but because it remains foreign to speech.” At the same time, “no discussion would either begin or continue

without it.” The secret, that there “is” no secret (the secret “being” that we cannot ever Anow for sure), is what drives us, what

drives literature, what drives thought, what impassions us and calls us forward.”” Recalling from Given Time that the gift “must keep a relation of foreignness to the circle.” and that it is also “the firsL mover of the circle,” 11 seems that gift, secret, and call bear

In common this quality of impassioning, of energizing, of enabling.”? Each is immemorial and quasi-transcendental. Equally, gift, secret, and call thus also disable any possibility of an adequate response. Responding as such is inpossible, for to respond to (by identifying) gift, secret, or call is to annul any one of them. ™ Derrida, Pass, 19.

Derrida, Pass, 23. “8 Derrida, Pass, 29.

Derrida, Pass, 27. ®™ Dernda, Pass, 29-30. See also Gaputo’s discussion in PUD, 107-12.

Derrida, GTI, 7, 30.

224 RETHINKING GOD AS GIFT Derrida needs no caller, since the call of which he speaks needs no embodiment. And yet there is another turn within his work that unsettles this conclusion and opens ever so quietly onto a theological possibility.

In Polttics of Friendship, Derrida explores the call of and te friendship, which once again is linked with impossible responsibility.” But here we are dealing with a slightly different question.

For friendship implies a mutuality, a shared space. Under the guise of the call we have returned to the issue that plagues the relationship between Levinas and Derrida, which is the question of otherness, of the otherness of the Other and of the encounter with the Other.™ Derrida asks: “How are we to distinguish between ourselves, between cach of us who compose[s] this as yet so undetermined ‘we’?” In other words, he is asking about the proximity (using Levinas’s terms) of relationship prior to its articulation in knowledge, prior to its political manifestation. “Even

before the question of responsibility was posed, the question of

‘speaking in one’s own name, ... we are caught up, one and another, in a sort of heteronomic and dissymmetrical curving of

social space—more precisely, a curving of the relation to the other: prior to all organized socus."”* It is possible to observe in this idea a link with Maurice Blanchot’s “double dissymmetry” of

the relauion to the Other.” Unlike in Levinas (and Marion), where the absolute asymmetry that orders the relationless relation is problematic, here we have a proximity that can sustain an immemorial call to responsibility.

Within the curved space of the relation to the Other, there ts already responstbility.” ‘That 1s why the call to friendship, which ™ Dernida, PF especially in the essav “In Human Language, Fraternity.”

“Twill continue to use “Other.” rather than the “other” of the translavions of both Derrida and Blanchot, m order io keep the clarity of the Levinasian distinc lion.

Derrida, Ph, 231. ™ Blanchot, fC, 73.

’ “What is unfolding itself at this mstant—and we are finding it a somewhat disturbing experience—is perhaps only the sent deployment of that strange violence that has always insiiuated itself into the origin of the most innocent experiences of friendship and justice. We have begun to respond. We are already caught up, we are caught out, ima certain responstbility, and the most mehuctable responsibility—as if it were possible to think a responsibility without freedom.” Derrida, PF, 231.

RETHINKING TIE GIFT I 225 is always futural rather than present, is nevertheless a call that can

only be made on the basis of a past.” Speaking of the call in Heidegger, Derrida observes the strange “voice of the friend.” The call of the friend is prior to friendship, marking the very possibility (and impossibility) of friendship: It is perhaps in a region thus withdrawn from metaphysical subjec-

tivity that for Heidegger “the voice of the friend” rings out. The issue is perhaps what we were calling above a minimal “community’’—but also incommensurable to all others, speaking the same language or praying, or weeping, for translation against the horizon of a sole language, if only to manifest a disagreement: friend-

ship prior to friendships. One would have to add: “prior to” enmity.

This promise before friendships would be linked to the “yes, yes,” this promise of memory that we have attempted to analyze elsewhere. The double affirmation must remain essentially risky, threatened, open. Above all, it cannot allow itself to be defined or posited, it cannot be reduced to a determined position.”

The call of friendship is a call to responsibility, but a responstbility that cannot be specified in advance.” It is a call to responsi-

bility that comes from the Other.*! Moreover, this call is irreducible to knowledge, even and perhaps especially to the knowledge that is made present in phenomenology. In what 1s a very important passage with regard to Derrida and phenomenology, he remarks: In the course of this experience, the other appears as such—that 1s to say, the other appears as a being whose appearance appears with“(Let us note in passing that the logic of this call—*You-my-friends-be-myfnends-and-although-you-are-not-vet-my-friends-you-are-already,-since-t hat-iswhat-l-am-calling-you'}."” Dernda, PF, 235. *® Derrida, PF. 241.

“ Derrida, PR 244. “But if presently there is no Iriend, let us act so that henceforth there will be Inends of this ‘sovereign master friencship.” This is what f call you to; answer my call, this is our responsibility, Fnendship 1s never a present given, it belongs to the experience of expectation, promise, or engagement. [ts discourse is that of prayer, it maugurates, but reports nothing, 1 1s not satisfied with what ts, it moves out to this place where a responsibility opens up a future.” Derrida, DF, 236.

*'“Ttas assigned to us by the other, from the place of the other, well before any hope of reappropriauon allows us the assumption of this responsibility.” Derrida, PE 232.

226 RETHINKING GOD AS GIFT oul appearing, without being submitted to the phenomenological law of the originary and intuitive given that governs all other appearances, all other phenomenality as such. The altogether other, and every other (one) is every (bil) other, comes here to upsct the order

of phenomenology. And good sense. That which comes before autonomy must also exceed 1t—that 1s, succeed it, survive and indefinitely overwhelm 1t.*”

This sequence is rich with possibilities, not least because, as an experience of relationless relation, it offers another opening on the

question ot God. That is not to say that the relation with the human other (where “the other appears as a being whose appearance appears without appearing’) is the same as the relation with God, but it might be suggested that it points in the direction of the relauion with God, who, certainly, also exceeds the capacity of phenomenology. The passage bears a family resemblance to certain passages In fhe Gift of Death, and surely that is not in the least coincidental. Two types of secrecy are pursued in The Gift of Death. There is the secret that Abraham bears, that is, the secret that he knows and cannot divulge if he is to be responsible. And then there is the secret that is his very “experience” of God. Derrida speaks of the experience of God as the expericnce of mystertum fremendum,

the secret known only in the trembling that 1s the trace of its passing. This is the secret that can never be known, that “is” not anything. And not “being” anything, it bears a relationship to that secret that I have already canvassed as that which drives ail passion and all thought. The two secrets of non-knowledge can of course be distinguished by the fact that the one is a quast transcendental, while the other is not only transcendental, but possibly also transcendent and possibly the Transcendent. Nevertheless, each 15 named only as secret, and therefore there 1s an undecidability that protects any possible reference. This leads mic to ask whether, within that undecidability and

because of the protection there afforded, there is elsewhere in Derrida room for a thinking of God as secret, for a Uuinking of a secret call of God, a secret giving of God. If there is such room, it is likely to be found in the context of Derrida’s writing specifically “Derrida, PF. 232.

RETHINKING THE GIFT U ei on negative theology and religion. Three texts spring immediately to mind: “How to Avoid Speaking: Denials”; ““Post-Scriptum:

Aporias, Ways, and Voices,” which was later adapted and published as “Saufle nom”; and “Foi et Savoir.’’** For reasons already noted, it is generally recognized that Derrida is critical of negative theology.*! Nevertheless, he is not dismissive of it, suggesting that “T trust no text that is not in some way contaminated with negauve theology, and even among those texts that apparently do not have, want, or believe they have any relation with theology in gen-

eral.* The texts above reflect different approaches. In “How to Avoid Speaking” Derrida is responding to the assertion that deconstruction is simply another form of negative theology, and so we find there that he reads negative theology largely in terms of its failure, Yet in “Sauf le nom” it seems that there is room for its rchahbilitation.

In “How to Avoid Speaking” there is an initial attempt to suggest the parameters of negative theology, using for a Christian perspective the Mystical Theology of Denys (Dionysius) the Areopagite. Derrida tells us that “negative theology” has come to designaic a certain typical attr tude toward languayc, and within it, in the act of definition or attr“8 Derrida’s “How to Avoid Speaking” is an mmportant text, not least because itis one of the places where he adverts to Marion's work, most frequently in the notes. “Post-Scriptum: Aporias, Ways. and Voices” appears in the same callection at 283-323, although references will be made to Derrida, SEN. “4 See Toby Foshay’s “Tntwoduction: Denegation and Resentment” in Derrida and Negative Theology, 1-24, especially at 3 and 5. See also Hart, TS, for example at 193.

* Derrida, SLN, 69. Regarding the relationship between deconstrucuion and theology, Hart observes: “Let us shift focus for a moment and see how deconstruction stands with respect to theology. At first the picture seems clear cnough, Since God is ‘the name and the element of that which makes possible an absolutely pure anc absolutely self-present self-knowledge’ any God talk, any theology, would be thoroughly shaken by différance. Not only is the sign complicit with metaphysics but also it is “essentially theological.’ All talk of a center 1s ‘theological, and differance ‘blocks every relationship to theology.’ for all that, deconstruction 1s neither proposing a ‘return to finitude’ nor calling for ‘God's death,’ And a closer inspection of Derrida’s texts reveals that he is concerned solely with the metaphysics in theology, and would be sympathetic to those theologies, if any, that do not ‘appropriate the resources of Greek conceptuality.’ There is at least one, it seems, a contemporary deconstrucuve theology.” Kevin Hart, mtroduction to an excerpt from ‘How to Avoid Speaking,” The Postmodern

228 RETHINKING GOD AS GIFT bution, at attitude toward semantic or conceptual determination. Qaommmen Haw ") mrasvieciwmnsl RAunmimthecic tiac.e nT Partaata Lira tharssleaeis: ior es

seis ill (lintel aid cA i" LF PY SPEC PF EEE BEY POLE Es LELCHL Phh ey tthe BEAK EEN LUFLE

sists of considering that every precicative languape is inadequate to

the essence, in truth to the hyperessenuality (the bemp beyond Bemg)} of God, consequently, only a negative (“apophatic’’) attribugion can claim to approach God, and to prepare us for a silent

intuition of God.

Derrida notes that the rhetoric of negative theology can readily be imitated, but he points out that its context is quite specific, framed as it is by prayer and by the address to the other.*’ We find within this definitiion—or at least this “provisional hypothesis’’—the chief element of Derrida’s concern. According to Derrida, while negative theology emphasizes the inadequacy of all predication, 1t nevertheless aims at a conceptual object that is still a type of being. In referring to God as “hyperessential,” Derrida argues, Christian theology simply posits God as a preeminent

bemg, even if this being 1s beyond the realm of being.** This seems to undermine the very negation that 1s characteristic of the genre.’ In trying not to say anything, negative theology already God; A Theological Reader, ed. Graham Ward (Oxford: Blackwell, 1997), 161-62 [hereafter Hart, JHAS}]. *“ Derrida, HAS, 74.

"7 Derrida distinguishes between prayer and the encomium, and in a lengthy footnote he explains a connection here (and a fundamental disagreement) with the work of Marion in /D, Derrida’s point is that the encomium, while performative, Maintains some elements of attribution. HAS, L111. See also Hart, ZAVAS, 164:

“Yet, as Derrida pomts out, there is no pure prayer, no ‘address to the other as other,’ for it 1s supplemented by an encomium. The God beyond being is deter-

mined in advance to be the Christan God. ... Were it uttered in complete silence, the prayer still could not crase the possibility of its inscription and all that follows from this. And so, Derrida concludes, one cannot approach Gad, as negative theology promises, by passing from language to silence. Even silence is marked by the effects ol differance.”

si “Negative theology seems to reserve, beyond all positive predication, beyond all negation. even bevond Being, some hvperesseiitialin, a bempg beyond Being.” Derrida, HAS. 77. Sce also the notes at 131-33, especially insofar as they concern a reading of Marron. And which is suggested by Derrida as follows: “By a more or less tenable analogy, one would thus recognize some traits, the family resemblance of negative theology, in every discourse that seems to return in a regular and insistent

manner to this rhetone of negative determination, endlessly multiplying the defenses and the apophatic warnings: this, which 1s called X (for example, text, writing, the trace, differance, the hymen, the supplement, the pharmakon, the parergon etc.) ‘is’ neither this nor that, neither sensible nor intelligible, neither

RETHINKING THE GIFT I 229 says far too much, effectively operating as a type of positive theolovers: OF) Clare MShepereccantisditee? de wnmart afirhe laneiiage nfiailhe Atv

Uy. HL Ty peel Cas Lilia ly i pal L ASE Lie: Falintiaat TIE TEL ivi}

tical Theology, it seems that Derrida’s criticism will be difficult to overcome. Those who respond on the issue tend to do so by quesPia ana meee dae ee ae 4 Lie eae rea tim beter VY omen LI. eet States acta that

ULCPLPLE LSS MALO CEPOL EELS Ca SPY pe OEE ett Ly. PRO Vid LLARL SURE LO Lidell

“hyper” has a negative rather than positive meaning, that it suggests transgression or violauon, In other words, hyperessenuality is used to indicate a rupture of essentiality rather than a surplus. According to Hart, who borrows the phrase from Levinas, the God of Pseudo-Dionysius (is) “otherwise than being.” TsKeretain te Derrida there are other difficulties thatLAheANF lorates PRL E EL LAS BPR ERAGE, LEER Ch APE RAEN LEAR CER in regard to negative theology. There is its association with mystical prayer, which on his reading carries with it the promise of

God’s presence in the eventual union of the soul with God.” Then there is his insistence that what sharply divides différance from negative theology is that the latter springs from a cause and is oriented to a feos.’ With regard to union, it must be underlined that in Christian mysticism the integrity and uniqueness of both

human and divine persons 1s upheld to the end. In contrast to some other traditions, the Christian tradition maintains that the human soul never fuses with the divinity in the mystical expertence. Whatever union means, it does not mean dissolution. Reposiuive nor negative, neither inside nor outside, neither superior nor inferior, neither acuve nor passive, neither present nor absent, not even neutral, not even subject to dialectic with a third moment, without any possible sublation (Aufthebung’). Despite appearances, Uren, unis X is nerther a concept nor even a name; it does fend itself to a series of names, but calls for another syntax, and exceeds even the order and the structure of predicative discourse, It ‘is’ not and does not sav what ‘is.’ [Lis written completely otherwise.” Derrida, HAS, 74. ™ See Derrida, HAS, 81. Hart disputes this, saving that “negative theology performs the deconstruction of positive theology.” Han, TS, 202. "To say that God is Ayperouseous is to deny that God 1s a bemg of any kind, even the highest or origmal being. As jones remarks, Pseudo-Dicinysius denies that God is a bemg and denics that God is he-ing (a). The cliviaaty, he says, is ‘beyond be-ing beyond beingly before all’ or—to borrow Levinas’ concise formulanon— otherwise than beng, Given this, Derricla is wrong to say thal negalive theology reserves a supreme being beyond the categories of bemg. Just as ‘sign’ must be crossed out in the decoustrucuion of metaphysics, so too must ‘God’ in the deconstruction of positive theology. The God of neyative theology is transcendent in that He transcends being, all conceptions of being as presence, as well as the categories of gender.” Hart, TS, 202. ™ Derrida, HAS, 79-81.

Derrida, HAS, 99, 81.

230) RETHINKING GOD AS GIFT garding the cause and end of negative theology, it would seem to me that this only becomes limiting where it becomes a question of proof rather than one of faith, since faith itself only emerges out of differance. God may not be differance, but perhaps the experience of God is given according to différance.

“Saul le nom” begins with a recognition that the apophatic voice Is plural, and in fact Derrida constructs the essay as if 1t were

a dialogue (or the minutes of a discussion group), so that there is an ambiguity in the way it unfolds.?' Negative theology is being considered by negative dreology. While not wishing to overlook the effects of this complex device, I shall continue to refer to the authorial voice as if it were sing dar. Derrida once again explores the parameters of negative theology. He acknowledges that negative theology is ke the experience of deconstruction.”® [It is a language, yet it exceeds language. He

tells us that “the proposition (‘What is called “negative theology” ...is a language’) has no rigorously determinable reference: neither in its subject nor in its attribute, we just said, but not even in its copula.” Itis as though we have a preunderstandIng of negative theology, but once we begin to articulate it, we are

already too late, and its possibilities have alrcady been exhausted.*’ Negative theology is the kenosis of discourse, a formal-

ization without content.°* What is most striking about these descriptions is a sense that they are driven by immemoriality. Negative theology always comes after the event, although it has a fu-

ture dimension as well in that it always will have been.*? We discern that negative theology makes no reference to a presence, 4 Regarding plurality, see Derrida, SEN, 35, 66. “ Derrida, SEN, 43: “This thought seems vaguely familiar to the experience of deconstruction. Far from being a methodical technique, a possible or necessary procedure, unrolling the law of a program and applying rules, that is unfolding

possibihtues, deconstruction has often been defined as the very experience of the (impossible) possibility of the impossible, of the most tmpossible, a condition that deconstruction shares with the gift, the ‘yes,’ the ‘come,’ decision, testimony, the secret etc. And perhaps death.” ™ Derrida, SIN, 48.

“ Derrida, SIN, 49.

“The statement of negative theology etupties iself by definiton, by vocaton, of all muulive plenitude.” Derrida, SIN, 50, 51. ™ Derrida, S/N, 600, 58.

RETHINKING THE GIFT I 241 not even—in that sense—an absent presence.’ So we find a series of passages that emphasize the way in which negative theology

refers only through its bearing of a trace.’ It refers us to the impossible possible, or as we read in “Foi et Savoir,” “Vincalcula-

ble au coeur du calculable,’ the incalculable in the heart of the calculable." Negative theology is like a memory, testifying to a yet Immemorial event that leaves a mark on language.’*? Derrida describes it

as a “passion that leaves the mark of a sear in that place where the impossible takes place.’"' It carries a wound, Just legible.” It bears witness to an unknowable God who has nothing save a name:

Save the name that names nothing that might hold, not even a divinity (Golthe:t), nothing whose withdrawal does not carry away

every phrase that tries to measure itself against him. “God” “is” the name of this bottomless collapse, of this endless desertification of language. But the trace of this negative operation is inscribed 27 and en and as the event (what comes, what there 1s and which. 1s always siigular, what finds in this kenosis the most decisive condition of its comme or its upsurging). Phere zs this event, which reunains, even if this remnance is not more substantial, more essential than this God, more ontologically determinable than this name of God of whom it is said that he names nothing that is, neither this nor that. It is even said of him that he is not what is given there in the sense of es gibt: He is not what gives, his ts beyond all gifts. mM On this question of presence, LT would refer back to Hart's introduction: “The theologian should remember that Derrida nowhere rejects the notion of presence. He argues that presence cannot present itself; the possibility of inscription is a necessary one, and one that ensures the possibility of division, There may be a God, and this God may be pure self-presence, but He cannot be intuited or revealed in the preseut.”” Hart, FAAS, 164-65. Counmenting on Angelus Silestus, Derrida remarks: “This ‘more,’ this beyoud, this Ayper (ber) obviously mtrocduces an absolute heterogeneity in the

order and in the modality of the possible. The possibility of the impossible, of the ‘more possible’ that as such is also possible (‘more impossible than the nnpossible’), marks an absolute interrupuon in the regime of the possible that nonetheless remains, if this can be said, in place.” Derrida, SLN, 43. i! Derrida, FS, 85; FAK, 65,

Derrida, SEN, 54. Derrida, SEN, 59-60. '™ Derrida, SIN, 60. "© Derrida, SEN, 55—56.

232 RETHINKING GOD AS GIFT The name is that of the unnameable nameable, the nameable beyond the name.'*? Here Derrida goes out of his way to tell us that it is not God who is given, or God who gives in the name. But I do not think that he thereby completely dismisses the possibility of the gift or the self-giving of God. What he dismisses is the demand for any more than the event, any more than the ‘collapse’”’ or the “remnance.” He dismisses the association of God with Hei-

degger’s given or with a place of givenness. God is not ‘what gives’; God ts “beyond all gifts,” in the sense that God cannot be identified as giver save by a trace that 1s read in faith. All we are left with is the name that constantly escapes us, a “desertification” reminiscent of kAGéra.

Whereas in “How to Avoid Speaking” we gain a sense of the failure of negative theology owing to its inability to desist from speaking of the unspeakable, in “Sauf le nom” we get a sense that negative theology nevertheless functions as a supplementary discourse of rupture. In general terms, how docs negative theology work? Most significantly, negative theology works aporetically.

The event to which it bears witness (is) impossible, unknowable,

an aporia. Negative theology opens onto the aporia of the secret.!% We are reminded that the only way through an aporia is via decision, a decision that passes through madness.!”" This does not force us to the decision of religious faith, but 1t opens up its posstbility, as much negatively as positively, The mystic can never prove that God has passed in his or her “experience.” Neverthe-

less, that aporetic experience is possible means that we cannot exclude the possibility that God may so pass.!4°

Negative theology works as hyperbole. “This hyperbole a@nnounces. 11 announces m a double sense: it sgneads an Open possibility, but it also provokes thereby the opening of the possibility. Its event is at once revealing and producing, post-scripium and proleDerrida, SEN, 58, ™ Derrida, SLN, 60. m® “But isn’t the uncleared way also the condition of decszen or event, which consists in opening the way, mn (sur)passing, Uhus in going beyond? In (sur) passing

the aporia?”’ Derrida, SLN, 54. “The sole decision possible passes through the madness of the undecidable and the impossible: to go where (wo, Ort, Wort) it is impossible to go.”” SLN, 59.

"? With regard to aporetic experience, see Derrida, Af, tor example at 15, 19, 32.

RETINNKING THE GIFT I 233 gomenon, inaugural writing.” !!! Then it works in Conversion, arising out of the conversion of the one who writes, but also involving a conversion from God to others. At the very start of this section, it was observed that the context of negative theology was prayer

and the address to the other, There is a movement that occurs where prayer, the address to God, becomes confession, a testimony.''? In the end, negative theology involves surrender.'™* It ts

desire that lets go of its object." Emerging from the address to God, it becomes an address to no matter whom.!' Finally, negative theology works through plurality: the plurality of voices (the voice of radical critique and the voice of dogmatic

assurance) that contradict one another; the plurality of places (the place of revelation and the place of khéra) that exclude one another; the plurality of paths (Greek philosophy and Christian mysticisin) that cross one another.''® Negative theology produces fissures: it fractures the cogito, divides being from knowing, un-

dermines every thesis, and drives a wedge into the analogy between creator and creature.''’ The fissure is the madness through which we can only pass by decision.

Having considered briefly the first two of the three texts that have a bearing on Derrida’s speaking of God, I turn now to the third, “Foi et Savoir,” which has a completely different style and focus. “Foi et Savoir” is a meditation on the very possibility of religion. Derrida notes that religion often concerns itself with “the name,” with speaking “in the name of” something or someone, with naming, speaking in its own name. Additionally, relli"Derrida, SIN, 62. Are we able to link the “hyper” of hyperbole with the “hyper” of hyperessentiality? Since Derrida here translates “hyper” as ‘ultra, aiwdela, beyond, viber,” are we finally able to redeem hyperessentuality from the clutches of ontology: Waitis hyperbole that “names the movement of transcendence that carries or leansports beyond being or beingness,” surely hyperessenliahity cannot name what cocs not utterly transcend, or transpresse MU! Derrida, SON, 39, 40: “This moment of writing is done for ‘afterwards.’ But

Halse follows the conversion. [t remains the trace of a present moment of the confession that would have no sense without such a conversion, without this address to the brother readers.” "Ss Derrida, SLN, 74, Wt Derrida, SEN, 37.

5 Derrida, SLN, 74. "i Derrida, SLN, 66-67, 75-76, 62. "7 Derrida, SLN, 66, 65, 67, 66.

234 RETHINKING GOD AS GIFT gion is often about light. It sheds light, brings to light, and approaches the lhiminous. Phenomenology is also about bringing to light, or learning to see.''® Yet religion has to do with empty

places, what Derrida will call places of the aporia. He names three: the island, the promised land, and the desert, although it will be on the desert that he focuses by and large. While these places form the horizon of thought, they also indicate the need for a certain suspension or interruption of any horizon. ‘Paradoxically, the absence of horizon conditions the future itself. The springing up of the event should breach any horizon of expectation. From where the apprehension of an abyss in these places,

for example a desert in the desert, there where the one neither can nor should sce coming that which would have to or would be able to—perhaps—come,"" There is a distinction to be made between faith and religion, and also between faith and theclogy.)”’ Derrida then discusses the

historical nature of revelation, which leads him to develop the notion of “revealability,” which would be the possibility of any revelation at all. Perhaps, he wonders, revealability is that which is revealed in revelation; revealability is the origin of light. And yet Derrida has in mind a more “nocturnal” light, a more “‘anarchic” and “anarchival” origin, “more than the arch-original”: “a certain desert in the desert, the one that would make possible, open, hollow out or infinitize the other.”"! This origin would be heterogeneous (and so non-original), bearing two names, the “messianic” and “khéra.”'** It is this double experience of the desert, prior to revelation, that Derrida wants to think. Derrida speaks elsewhere of a messianism without a messiah, where the messiah would always be coming but would never be 18 Derrida, FS, 14-15; FK, 6. Hence the contrast with Marron, who can seem also to be making rehgion a question of the light.

"9 Derrida, #S, 13: “Paradoxalement, absence dhorizon conditionne l'a-

venir méince. Le surgissement de Pévénement doit trouer tout horizon d'attente. D’ont Vappréhension d'un abime en ces licux, par example un désert dans le

désert, la on Ton ne peut ni doit voir venir ce qui devrait ou pourrait— peut étre—venir.”” FR, 7, 120 Derrida, #5, 17; FK, 10.

I Derrida, £S, 26: “plus que Varchtoriginaure’, “un certain désert dans le désert, celui qui rend possible, ouvre, creuse ou infinitise autre.” FA, 16, 122 Derrida, FS, 27; FK, 17.

REVHINKING THF. GIFT i 230 present, never arrive. Here he speaks of “the opening to the future or to the coming of the other as the advent of justice, but without horizon of expectation and without prophetic foreshadowing.” !?} The messianic would expose us to surprise. Experience

(Vexpérience) would be structured by a waiting without expectation, by the sheer desire for or hope in justice. There would here be faith without dogma." The other aspect of the desert experience, or of the experience

of desertification, would take the name of khéra. The word is taken from Plato’s Timaeus, and Derrida uses it frequently because it suggests for him a place of absolute exteriority that is no place at all, but more of a “spacing.” Khéra... would be the place-name, a place-name, and very singular, for this spacing which, not Ictting itself be dominated by any theological, ontological or anthropological instance, without age,

without history and “older” than all oppositions, . . . would not even show itself as “beyond Being,” according to a negative way, As aresult, khéra remains absolutely impassible and heterogencous to all processes of historical revelation or anthropo-theological ex-

perience, which nonetheless presuppose its abstraction, It will never have entered into religion and it will never let itself be sacralized, sanctified, humanized, theologized, cultivated, historicized. Radically heterogeneous to the healthy and to the safe, to the holy and to the sacred, it never lets itself be endemnefied. Even this cannot be said in the present, because khéra never presents itself as such. It is neither Being, nor the Good, nor God, nor Man, nor History. It will always resist them, if will always have been (and no future

anterior, even, will have been able to reappropriate ...) the very place of an infinite resistance, of an infinitely impassible remaining: a completely other without face.'* 2s Derrida, £S, 27: “ouverture a lVavenir ow a la venue de Fautre comme avéne-

ment de la justice, mais sans horizon d’attente et sans préfiguration prophét ique.” FA, 17.

' Derrida, FS, 28; FA, 18. Of course, faith without dogma would mean that the object of faith could never be identified. But this is not so unusual in one sense. Rahner's God, too, is unthematized, at least insofar as being the goal of selftranscending desire. 46 Derrida, FS, 31: Khéra... serait... le nom de leu, un nom de lieu, et fort singulier, pour cef espacement qui, ne se laissant dominer par aucune instance théeologique, ontologique ou anthropologiquc, sans age, sans histoire ct plus ‘ancien’ que toutes les oppositions ... ne sannonce méme pas comme ‘au-cdela de Pétre, selon une voie négative. Du coup, AAére reste absolument impassible

236 RETHINKING GOD AS GIFT Derrida is quick to add that while kAéra is not anything (“not a being or of the present”), it is also not the Heideggerian Nothing. He maintains that this desert would be “prior to” (if the language of priority can maintain any sense here) the desert of “revelations and withdrawals, lives and deaths of Ged, all figures of kenosis or of transcendence,” and so forth.'”> But it would also be subsequent to it, Derrida noting the oscillation between revelation and revealability that cannot be ultimately decided.'?’ The experience of “the desert in the desert”” would lead, Derrida says, to a new

tolerance for alterity, to a respect for the ‘distance of infinite alterity as singularity,”''?*

In a “post-scriptum” that is longer than that which precedes it, Derrida talks about religion as response and responsibility.’*’ The passage 1s reminiscent of Levinas, for whom religion is relationship with the Other.'*? Religion is response and it is testimony, with or without God as a witness." Religion involves faith, but faith suffers the constant temptation to try to convert itself into knowledge,'™ Faith is not about seeing, not about knowing, not about conceiving anything.'* Here Derrida seems to align himself et hétérogéne a tous les processus de révélanon historique ou d’expérience anthropo-théologique, qui en supposent néanmoins abstraction. Elle ne sera jamais entrée en religion et ne se laissera jamais sacraliser, sanctifier, humaniser, théologiser, cultiver, historiahser. Radicalement hétérogéne au sain et au sauf, au saint et au sacré, elle ne se laisse jamats imdemaniser, Cela méme ne peut se dire au présent, car ARéra ne se présente jamais comme telle. Elle n’est mV Etre, ni le Bien, ni Dieu, ni WM Homme, ni Histoire. Elle leur réststera toujours, elle aura toujours été (et aucan futur anténieur, méme, maura pu réapproprier . . .) le fea méme d’unc résistance infinie, d'une restance infiniment impassible: un tout autre sans visage. FR, 20-21, 6 Derrida, #S, 31-32; FK, 21. What kind of priority is Derrida talking about? It would be unlike him to refer to a priority in time. It scems he speaks once again of a quasi-transcendental priority, since it enables (and presumably disables) revelation. 127 Derrida, FS, 32; FK, 21. 28 Derrida, iS, 33: BK, 22. '°9 Derrida, I'S, 39; FK, 26. 180 Levinas, 77, 40.

'’ Derrida, FS, 39~41; FAK, 26-29. Note Caputo’s gloss: ‘For this desert. khéral religion does not necessarily involve God, and while it ceriainly involves faith, faith is not necessarily faith m the God of the great moneotheisms.” Caputo, PTD, 157. ™ Derrida, &S, 43-45; FR, 50-32. 9 Derrida, FS, 50, FA, 47. See also the discussion of photology in Derrida, GD), 98if.

RETHINKING THE GIFT II 237 with Levinas, And once again, we are reminded of Marion’s difficulty, where in setting himself within the theological orientation

of ‘seeing’ (Balthasar) and within the phenomenological tradition of “presenting” (Husserl), he leaves himself litthe room to move where agnosticism is required. Yet religion is more than faith. Derrida in fact observes two experiences of religion: the experience ol belief (in which category he includes faith, rather than the inverse}, and the experience of “lindemne’ (which could

be translated as the “not lost’), which includes the experiences of sacredness or holiness.? While the two approaches cannot be reduced to one, they do come together in the experience of testimony, or as Derrida seems to suggest at another point, in the oscillation between possibility and determined necessity.'* Attestation is what incarnates possibility, as it were. And attestation is

always before another, if not also before God. The faith that makes attestation possible 1s what enables a relationship with the other, a relationship that is, nevertheless, without relation. Faith, response, responsibility, testimony, the possible, the embodied— these are the words Derrida uses to think religion, and to think it from a khoral place (with a twist of the messianic). But while khdra

“gives a place (perhaps), it does so without any semblance of generosity.“ Any khéral gift would be forever undecidable. I have sought in three places something of Derrida’s response

to the question of God, and have found instead only what it means to fail in speaking and to speak with a kind of failure. In looking for God as a question I have encountered only secrecy: Derrida never gives a direct answer." Yet the secret has its own St Derrida, £5, 46; FK, 33. “Lindemne™ is a juridical term meaning “without loss.” In its usage here it almost suggests “the indemnified.” Caputo translates “not being damned or damaged.” Caputo, PTJD, 157. The division between belief and sacrality is an interesting move for Derrida to make, and it may represent two styles of religiosity, the one desirous of the invisibie, and the other comforted by the visible, the ritual, the tangible signs that apparently point to the holy. It is not a distinction I would have drawn naturally, but it does have a certain logic to it. 5 With regard to the cxperience of tesumony, sce Derrida, &S, 83; EK, 63. With regard to the “irreducible gap” between possibility and determined necessity (or history), see £S, 76; FR, 58. 6 Derrida, FS, 84-86; FK, 64-66.

7 And I do not believe we are any closer with the following profession: “. . . but she must have known that the constancy of God in my hfe 1s called by other

258 RETHINKING GOD AS GIFT call, and as we have seen, a call is a call for a response. [t could nerhane eraterly: Lo c-aiet that if there te on necting 1mf Clacl far Thar r+ BAEK PAD ace aa? BAL. OEE LAbettL It LIAL In LS al Lqten OLInsel VFL WFRPELEL PAF Eu)

rida, then ii would be found in that place where faith responds to the other. And there it would be impossible to say, impossible to know (since secret), whether or not God had called, much less whether or not God gave or was given or was gift. All horizons of expectation would need to have been suspended. Yet the acdmission of such nescience is not so strange. It is not foreign to faith but necessarily at its heart, making choice possible, and obedient

to the exigency of the gift.'"* If God were (to be) the one who gives, if God were given, if God made a gift of Godself, then I could not know it, but only believe it, and believe it only in responding to every other who 1s (every bit) other. The Gift of Death names, so that { quite rightly pass for an atheist, the Ommipresence to me of what I call God in my absolved, absolutely private language beime neither thai of an eyewitness nor that of a voice domg anything other than talking to me without saying anything, nor a transcendent law or an immanent schechina, that feminine figure of Yahweh who remains so strange and so familiar to me, but the secret 1 am excluded from, when the secret consists m the fact that you are held to a secrecy by those who know your secret, how many are there, and clo not dare admit to you that this 1s no longer a secret for them, that they share with you the open secret, letting you reckon that they know without saying, and, from that pomt on, what you have neither the nght nor the strength to contess, it is just as useless to make it known, to hand it over to this public notoriety you are the first and the only one to be excluded from, properly theological hypothesis of a blank sacrifice sending the bidding up to infinity, God coming to circulate among the unavowables, unavowable as he remains himself, like a son not bearing my name, like a son not bearing his name, like a son not bearing a name, and if, to give rise to this beyond of the name, in view and by reason of this unacceptable appellation of self for my mother has become silenced without dying, T write that there 1s foo much love in my life, emphasizing foo much, the better and the worse, that would be true, love will have got the better of me, my faithfulness stands any test, I am faithful even to the test that does harm, to my evthanasias.” Jacques Dernda, “Circumfession,” in Bennington and Derrida, Jacques Dernda, 155-57. ™ Hart concludes HTAS with a “quick sketch” of the believer who would be

weet one perbe i VD Waeeeta eden tc epee lee oes opted lIaage rd. tLe cee whey cgeeea Ded east fas

fe PeceP ka ALP PLE EPC E EAL SOR APTER ERE SIUPR ES CPEB WUT A, EUW RAG SEW VVRLFLLULL LEASE LL

God's presence while nol expecting to experience it in the present. The hfe of faith would depend on the interpretation of traces. It would be a negative way, not necessarily by virtue of accepting a ‘negative theology’ but by dint of experiencing an aporia, an inexorable demand to choose between Icgiumate alternatives. One would look to the God rendered possible by exegesis and philosophy, while at the same time answering to the God who upsets the realm of the possible, who arrives in a singular manner outside the Known and the expected” (165). In discussign of this passage, Hart adds tliat “the traces are not (hemaused at first hut become thematised in the exercise of faith.”

RETHINKING THE GIFT I 239 offers, I believe, Derrida’s most sustained thinking on this secret

eft: On what condition is responsibility possible? On the condition that

the Good no longer be a transcendental objective, a relation between objective things, but the relation to the other, a response to the other; an experience of personal goodness and a movement of intention. ... On what condition does goodness exist beyond all calculauon? On the condition that goodness forget itself, that the movement be a movement of the gift that renounces itself, hence a movement of infinite love. Only infinite love can renounce itself and, m order to become finite, become incarnated in order to love the other, to love the other as a finite other. This gift of infinite love comes from somewhere and is addressed to someone; responsibility demands irreplaceable singularity. Yet only death or the apprehension of a death can give this irreplaceability.'

7 Derrida, GUT, 50-51.

This Page Intentionally Left Blank

EPILOGUE: NAMING THE GIFT, GIVING A NAME, RETHINKING GOD AS GIFT THE QUESTION with which I have been occupied throughout this

study is a theological one: how ts it possible to speak of God as gift? And the path that has been traveled in response to that question perhaps seems to have had little to do with theology as such. Yet if Anselm’s famous definition of theology as “faith seeking understanding” is in any way valid, then this book has not been far from theology at all, at least in the sense thal it is an attempt to understand what it might mean for God to give Godself, That the resources on which I have drawn are not from theological tradition, but from contemporary thought, does not exclude my reflection on this question at its most preluninary level of possibil-

ity. At the same time, those resources do not lead to specifically Christian answers, or at least they serve to illustrate that any speci-

fication of religious “experience” will have to rely on a risk of faith. To say as much seems like a commonplace, but it also seems that the radical nature of this position is rarely taken on board in

its entirety. No serious theologian suggests that God can be known as such (where knowing has the sense of comprehending,

or bringing to presence). But if it is the case that any ‘experience” of God must therefore overwhelm (or, equally, underwhelm) consciousness, it must also be confessed that affirming such an experience as one of God involves a hermeneutic from the start. There is no revelation that is not always and already interpreted (as Revelation), that leaves open the possibility of its reinterpretation over and over again.’ At this point the real difficulty becomes evident. It is one thing to admit that the object of theology cannot be made an object, and that God overwhelms the ‘Tam indebted to Kevin Hart for his discussions with me on this point.

242 RETHINKING GOD AS GIFT understanding. But it is another to allow—really to allow—that there are no theological givens that are purely given. It is a humbling thing to admit that truth depends on a judgment and not on a “fact.” The stakes are high. Suddenly the nature of risking one’s life on the Gospel takes on its proper degree of danger. To say that revelation/ Revelation is always and already interpreted is not to underplay the role of religious communities in passIng on a tradition or traditions of interpretation, but only to point out that it is inderpretations that are passed on. The desire, on the

one hand, to harden those interpretations into static doctrines is perhaps understandable. But to clo that is like trying to seize the gift, and having it turn to dust before our eyes. To speak, on the other hand, of God as gift is to assent both to God and to gift as the impossible. It is not, as Milbank perhaps [ears, to consign each to simple impossibility, but to recognize the nature of the risk we

are taking in desiring their “reality.” It is to speak at the point of words’ failure, which is why the passage through phenomenology has been instructive. And it is to be overwhelmed by transcen-

dence, yet not a transcendence that exists somewhere “out there,” but one that has already interrupted me before T can begin speaking, before lam “here, now.” Throughout this work I have had cause to refer to the debate that took place between Marion and Derrida at Villanova in 1997. We find in the text of this debate not only confrontation over the nature of phenomenology and the question of the gift, but also

over the question of negative theology. | noted earlicr a point that Caputo brings out very well in his discussion of that debate, which is that for Marion, thought is overwhelmed by excess (the

saturated phenomenon), whereas for Derrida, thought is interrupted by the desert (the aporia).? Neither of these positions, | observed, is too far from the theological tradition(s) known as mysticism. It is possible that in mystical theology we find the clear-

est recognition of the gap between thought and referent that must always unsettle theological discourse in the way I have suggested. But to pursue a detailed discussion of mystical theology

and its relation to deconstruction is beyond the scope of this book, although of course it is of genuine relevance to Marion's “See Caputo, Af, 184-86 and passim.

EPILOGUE 243 theological work. It has, in any case, already been explored elsewhere.’ In closing I simply draw attention to the extraordinary discussion on the name /Name that to some extent seems to align Marion and Derrida, in spite of the many differences between them, especially where this name/Name might be thought in terms of gift.

Marion's opening address at the 1997 conference is titled “In

the Name.’ Here he rearticulates and responds to Derrida’s reading of negative theology, and also puts forward his own account of mystical theology and its relationship to the saturated phenomenon, Marion argues that mystical theology is misunderstood if it is merely secn as negation, and instead puts forward the Dionysian “third way,’ which goes beyond affirmation and negation in favor of “the experience of incomprehension.’” He maintains that Derrida reads mystical theology only in its negative mode (a reading Derrida vigorously contests), which allows Der-

rida to suspect “‘the supposedly ultimate and freestanding nega-

tion of implicitly and surreptitiously smuggling in and reestablishing an affirmation,’’® Dionysius, on the contrary, denies first that negation itself suffices to define a theology, next that negation Opposes affirmation in a simple ducl, and finally that negation re-establishes affirmation while pretending to invert it. In short, Dionysius always thinks negation exactly as he thinks affirmation—as one of the two values truths can have, one of the two forms of predication which it is precisely a matter of transgressing completely, as the discourse of metaphysics. With the third way, not

only is it no longer a matter of saying (or denying) something about something, itis also no longer a matter of saving or unsaying. but of referrmg to Him who ts no longer touched by nomimation. It is solely a matter of de-nominating.’ “On negative theology, mysucisin, Derrida, and deconstruction, sec, for example, Hart, 7S; Hart, VAS; and Hart, jOGE. There are many other places where this sort of discussigm Lakes place, but few where the knowledge of DerLida is as detailed and the expression as measured. Ou Marion and negative and mystical theology, see in particular Carlson's fidiseretion, as well as Caputo and Scanlon, GGP.

‘Jean-Luc Marion, “In the Name” [hereafter Manon, EN}, in Caputo and scanlon, GGP, 20-53, including Derrida’s response. * These words are quoted by Marion from Nicholas of Grusa, but they iustrate the point to perfection. ' Marion, IN, 25. * Marion, IN, 28.

244 RETHINKING GOD AS GIFT The reference to de-nomination is an important one because it leads Marion to speak about another of Derrida’s objections to “negative theology,” that prayer and praise have a destination, and therefore an object in mind. Marion’s response on this point is sound (and we later find Derrida in agreement with it): [Derrida’s objection] presupposes that it is unquestionable that praising, that is attributing a name to an interlocutor, indeed dedicating to him one name in particular, necessarily implies identifying him in and with his essence and thereby submits him to the “metaphysics of presence.”” Now what is proper to the proper name consists precisely in the faci that it never belongs properly—by and

as his essence—to the one who receives it. ... Thus, supposing that praise attributes a name to a possible God, one should conclude that it does not name him properly or essen-

ally, nor that 1t names him in presence, but that it marks his absence, anonymity and withdrawal—exactly as every name dissimulates every individual, whom tt merely indicates without ever manifesting. In this sensc, praise in mystical theology would in the case of divine proper names only reproduce an aporia.*

It is next necessary for Marion to repeat his arguments from elsewhere about the transgression of being, for he needs to inscribe the naming of mystical theology otherwise than according to any ontological horizon. Here, once again, we observe the characterislic of reverse intentionality: It's a matter of being exposed in one’s intending a non-object, exposed to the point of receiving from this non-object determinations that are so radical and so new that they speak to me and shape

me far more than they teach and inform me. Henceforth, the words spoken no longer say or explain anything about some thing

kept for and by my gaze. They expose me to what lets itself be sald only for the sake of no longer permitting me to say it, but to acknowledge it as goodness, and thus to love it.

Theology ts not, Marion claims, “obsessed with presence,” but only really theology insofar as it relinquishes the nced to have a concept of God fulfilled. “God cannot be seen, not only because nothing finite can bear his glory without perishing, but above all * Marion, JNU 28-29.

“Marion, IN, 32.

EPILOGUE 245 because a God that could be conceptually comprehended would no longer bear the title ‘God.’ ”'? Naming God does not result in a theology of presence, but one of absence, a phrase Marion immediately qualifies: “By theology of absence ... we mean not the non-presence of God, but the fact that the name that God is given, the name which gives God, which is given as God .. . serves to shield God from presence... and offers him precisely as an excep-

tion to presence. "| I have quoted Marion at length here because he addresses several important objections to his theological work and because

these observations correspond to a number of the points that have already been made with reference to Derrida and “negative theology.” But I also include this material because it serves as a prelude to his further explication of the saturated phenomenon. For Marion, proceeding with Dionysius’s “third way’’ means passing from a simple naming to a de-nomination, or better, it means entering into the Name and letting it name us. Preeminently, this entry into the Name takes place in baptism (a pomt with which

Derrida quite understandably has some difficulty). In order to support this very Balthasarian reversal, Marion tries to think the third way as a saturated phenomenen, which he describes follow-

ing the pattern of Etant donné. He then concludes: ‘The Name—it has to be chwelt in without saying it, but by letting it say,

name and call us. The Name is not said, it calls.’ Now, it has already been observed that Paul Ricoeur speaks of “the retreat of the Name,” and that Derrida refers to the name as that of the unnameable nameable, the namcable beyond the name.!* And it has been further noted that Derrida is in agreement with Marion on the question of the proper of the name.

“The proper name... is never proper” are Derrida’s words in response to Marion on the same point: “what is proper to the proper name consists precisely in the fact that Ww never belongs propertly... to the one who receives it.”'? A name—even a proper Name—is never proper because it never makes present, always 'O Marion, ZN) 34.

" Marion, N37. Marion, fN, 42. ‘Ss Derrida, SLN, 58.

" Derrida, in his response to Marion in JN, 45,

246 RETHINKING GOD AS GIFT iterable, its condition of possibility is also its condition of impossi-

bility. The meaning of a name/Name can never be exhausted. Like the gift, a name/Name is no-thing, gives no-thing. If God gives Godself as a name/Name, then we will never know if the name/ Name is a gift, and we will never be able to return it. Do Marion and Derrida speak the same language after all, even if they resist the language of the same? In one sense it seems in

the Villanova debate that the protagonists could not be further apart, at least insofar as Marion still argues for the success of phenomenology, and for excessive phenomena, whereas Derrida puts forward the failure of phenomenology and opts for aporetic expe-

rience. But in another sense, in this dialogue on the name, they could be quite close. If Janicaud were to interject, nonetheless, he would point out that Marion’s “name” is a “Name,” which sceims

to implicate Marion in going beyond a mere “possibility” and making a commitment to the outcome. Yet it could also be argued

that here Marion is just another punter. He lays his bets on the Name, but “his” Name gives—from the outside at least—no more than Derrida’s. That, it seems to me, is the substance of his argument with regard to mystical theology, and provided he remains within the betting ring, it 1s quite a convincing one. It as my argument that the question of God and the question of

the gift come from the same aporetic space, that it is not only possible to think God as gift, but highly appropriate to do so. I maintain this on the basis of an approach to the gift by way of and beyond phenomenology. There may well be other and better ways to approach God, but they do not serve to show, as I have hoped to do, the distinctive and problematic character of the gift itself.

Instead, many of the theological debates about the nature of grace simply affirm its gift quality, while at the same time struggling with the extent to which it can be received or must be cooperated with, and are less cognizant of the question of how it can be gift at all. A gift is both that which is passed freely from one person to another with generous intent and that which is never

present as gift, never identifiable as such. It seems to me that the Christian belief that God gives Godself in relationship with persons, freely and generously, must be characterized by the same condition of impossibility. lf God gives Godself without condition, then we will not be able to identify that gift as such: it will never

EPILOGUE 247 be present. The relationship must rest on a freedom that risks the possibility of misunderstanding or rejection, or else it will not be

a relationship of love but one opening onto coercion. Further, the gift will never be returned, not only because there could never be sufficient return, but because there will be no return address. Any God-gift will disseminate in desire, as Levinas (in conversation with Derrida) might say, not for God but for the undesirable par excellence, my neighbor. Not every gift (is) God, but it seems that God is only to be thought starting from the gift, which places

us im agreement with Marion in orientation if not entirely in terms of method. With a kind of Heideggerian flourish, we could write this ‘belonging together” as “God: gift.” Of course, to observe the common aporetic structure of God and the gift does not solve the aporia. An aporia, by definition, cannot be solved, but only resolved by a decision to act m a particular way, to act es if there were a way forward, I can never know whether or not I give or whether or not I receive, but I can believe it or desire it or act as if it were possible. So it is with God. That is not to say that faith is a matter of wishful thinking, but to affirm that faith can only be faith, as much faith in the gift as faith in God. Much religious mentality is devoted to a calculation of debts. It Is a very human thing to keep score, and it is even more human to despair under the weight of the goodness of another, fearing that the cebt will be too great ever to be paid in full. The thought of a God to whom we owe our very lives, and in whose sight we are always having to be made right, is often too much to bear.'® But if there is any good news, then the good news is that we owe God nothing, that God's (1s) a gift that is really free, and that in this gift, giving, which 1s strictly impossible, stirs in us as desire. We will never know whether God gives, or what God gives; we can

only believe, struggling with traces and with words half said and needing to be unsaid, that there (is) gift.

‘This theme is beautifully explored in the works of Sebastian Moore, OSB.

This Page Intentionally Left Blank

SELECT BIBLIOGRAPHY

SELECTED BOOKS BY JEAN-LUC MARION

L idole et la distance. Paris: Grasset, 1977. ID L @tre et Dieu. Paris: Cerf, 1986. Sur le prisme métaphystque de Descartes. Paris: Presses Universitaires

de France, 1986. Dieu sans Vétre: Hors-texte. 1982. Paris: Quadrige/Presses Universiiaires de France, 1991. Prolégoménes @ la chanité. 2nd ed. Paris: Editions de Ja Difference, L991. PC Réduction et donation: Recherches sur Husserl, Heidegger, et la phénoméno-

logie. Paris: Presses Universitaires de France, 1989. RED God Without Being. Trans. Thomas A. Carlson. Chicago; University of Chicago Press, 1991. GWB Questions cartésiennes: Méthode et mélaphysique. Paris: Presses Universitaires de France, 1991. QC/ La croisée du visible, 2nd ed, Paris: Presses Universitaires de France, 1996. CY Questions cartésiennes I: Sur Cego et sur Diew, Paris: Presses Universi-

taires de France, 1996. OCI Etant donné. Paris: Presses Universitaires de France, 1997. ED Reduction and Gruenness: Investigations of Hussert, Heidegger, and Phe-

nomenology. Trans. Thomas A. Carlson. Evanston: Northwestern University Press, 1998. RAG Cartesian Questions: Method and Metaphysics. Trans. Jeffrey L. Kosky

et al. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1999. On Descartes’ Metaphysical Prism. Trans. Jeffrey L. Kosky. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1999. The Idol and Distance: Five Studies. Trans. with an introduction by Thomas A. Carlson. New York: Fordham University Press, 2001.

250) SELECT BIBLIOGRAPHY SELECTED Essays BY JEAN-LUC MARION

“La double idolatrie: Remarques sur la différence ontologique et la pensée de Dieu.” Heidegger et la question de Dieu. Ed. Richard Kearney and Joseph S. O'Leary. Paris: Grasset, 1980. 46-74.

“La vanité de l’étre et le nom de Dieu.” Analogic et dialectigue: Essais de théologie fondamentale. Ed. P. Gisel and Ph. Secretan. Geneva: Labor et Fides, 1982. 17-49.

‘De la ‘mort de dieu’ aux noms divins: L’itinéraire théologique de la métaphysique.” Laval théologique ef philosophique 41, no. | (1985): 25-41. “L’Interloqué.” Who Comes After the Subject? Ed. Eduardo Cadava, Peter Connor, and Jean-Luc Nancy. New York: Routledge, 1991. 236-45. “Reponses a quelques questions.” Revue de Métaphysique et de Morale 96, no. 1 (1991): 65-76. REQ “Le sujet en dernier appel.”” Revue de Métaphysique et de Morale 6,

no. 1 (1991): 77-96. “Heidegger and Descartes,” Trans, Christopher Macann. Martin Heidegger: Critical Assessments. Ed. Christopher Macann. London: Routledge, 1992. 178-207,

“La phénomeéne saturé.” Jean-Francois Courtine, Jean-Louis Chretien, Michel Henry, Jean-Luc Marion, and Paul Ricecur, Phénoménatogie et théologie. Paris: Criterion, 1992. 79-128. PS

“Métaphysique et phénoménologie: Une réléve pour fa théologie,” Budletin de Litlérature Ecelésiastique 94, no. 3 (1993): 189-~ 206.

‘Metaphysics and Phenomenology: A Relicf for Theology.” Trans, Thomas A. Garlson. Critical Inquiry 20 (1993-94): 573-91. “Esquisse d'un concept phéenoménologigue du don.” Archive da Filosofia. Anno 62, nos. 1-3 (1994): 75-94. F

“Lautre philosophie premiere et la question de la donation.” Institut Catholique de Paris. Philosophie £7: Le statut contemporain de ia philusophie premiere. Paris: Beauschesne, 1996. 29-50. LAPP

“The Saturated Phenomenon.” Trans. Thomas A. Carlson. Phelosophy Today 40 (Spring 1996): 103-24, “Descartes and Onto-Theology.” Post-Secular Philosophy: Between Philosophy and Theology. Ed. Phillip Blond. London: Routledge, 1998, 67-106.

SELECT BIBLIOGRAPHY 251 “T’événement, le phénoméne et le révélé.” Transversalités: Revue de L'Institut Catholique de Parts 70 (April-June 1999); 4-25. “In the Name.” God, the Gift, and Postmodernism. Ed. John D. Gaputo and Michael J. Scanlon. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1999. 20-53. IN “Sketch of a Phenomenological Concept of the Gift.” Trans. John Conley, S.J., and Danielle Poe. Postmodern Philosophy and Christian Thought. Ed. Merold Westphal. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1999. 122-43. SPCG

SELECTED Books BY JACQUES DERRIDA

La Communication. Montréal: Edition Montmorency, 1973. Speech and Phenomena and Other Essays on Husserl's Theory of Signs.

Trans. David B. Allison and Newton Garver. Evanston: Northwestern University Press, 1973. SP Spurs: Nietzsche’s Styles. Trans. Barbara Harlow. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1978. Writing and Difference. Trans. Alan Bass. London: Routledge, 1978. WD

Dissemination. Trans. and ed. Barbara Johnson. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1981. D Positions. Trans. Alan Bass. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1981. Pos

Glas. Trans. John P. Leavey, Jr., and Richard Rand, Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1986. G The Post-Card: From Socrates to Freud and Beyond. ‘Vrans. Alan Bass.

Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1987. Psyché: Inventions de Vautre. Paris: Galilée, 1987.

The Truth in Painting. Trans. Geoffrey Bennington and Ian McLeod. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1987, 7P Edmund Husserl’s “Origin of Geometry’: An Introduction. Trans. John

P. Leavey, Jr. Rev. ed. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1989.

Of Spirit: Heidegger and the Question, Trans, Geoffrey Bennington and Rachel Bowlby. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1989,

Cinders. Trans. Ned Lukacher. Lincoln, Nebraska: University of Nebraska Press, 1991.

252 SELECT BIBLIOGRAPHY Donner le temps: 1. La fausse monnaie. Paris: Galilée, 1991. DT]

Given Time: 1. Counterfeit Money. Trans. Peggy Kamuf. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1992. GT1 Lhe Other Heading. Trans. Pascale-Anne Brault and Michael B. Naas. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1992.

Aponas. Trans. Thomas Dutoit. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1993. Ap Spectres of Marx: The State of the Debt, the Work of Mourning, and the New International. Trans, Peggy Kamuf. New York: Routledge, 1994.

the Gift of Death. Trans. David Wills. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1995. GD Points: Interviews, 1974-1994, Ed. Elisabeth Weber. Trans. Peggy Kamuf et al. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1995. Po Adieu: a Emmanuel Levinas. Paris: Galilée, 1997. Ad Politics of Friendship. Trans. George Collins. London: Verso, 1997. PF

Of Grammatology. Trans, Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak. Rev. ed. Balti-

more; Johns Hopkins University Press, 1998. Adieu: to Emmanuel Levinas. Trans. Pascale-Anne Brault and Michael Naas. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1999. Sur parole: Instantanés philosophiques. Paris: Editions de |’Aube, 1999.

Bennington, Geoffrey, and Jacques Derrida. Jacques Derrida. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1993.

Dufourmantelle, Anne, and Jacques Derrida. De L’hospitalite. Paris; Calmann-Lévy, 1997. DL’H

SELECTED ESSAYS BY JACQUES DERRIDA

“At This Very Moment in This Work Here 1 Am.” Re-reading Levtnas. Ed. Robert Bernasconi and Simon Critchley. Bloomington: Indiana Unversity Press, 1991. 11-48. AT VM “How to Avoid Speaking.” Trans. Ken Fricden. Derrida and Nega-

tive Theology. Ed. Harold Coward and Toby Foshay. Albany: SUNY Press, 1992. 73-142. HAS “On an Apocalyptic Tone Newly Adopted in Philosophy.” Dernda

SELECT BIBLIOGRAPHY 253 and Negative Theology. Ed. Harold Coward and Toby Foshay. Albany: SUNY Press, 1992. 25-72. “Passions.” Trans. David Wood. On the Name. Ed. Thomas Dutoit.

Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1995. 3-31. Pass “Sauf le nom.” Trans. John P. Leavey, fr. On the Name. Ed, Thomas Dutoit. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1995. 35-85. SEN “Faith and Knowledge.” Trans. Samuel Weber. Religion. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1996. 1-78. FK “Foi et Savoir.” La Religion. Ed, Jacques Derrida and Gianni Vattimo. Paris: Editions du Seuil, 1996. 9-86. FS

SELECTED Books BY EMMANUEL LEVINAS

Autrement qu'étre ou au-dela de Uessence. 1974, Paris: Livre de Poche, 1990.

Existence and Existents, Trans. Alphonso Lingis. The Hague: Martinus Nijhoff, 1978. AE Totalily and Infinity: An Essay on Exterionty. Trans. Alphonso Lingis.

The Hague: Martinus Nijhoff, 1979, 77 Otherwise Than Being er Beyond Essence. Trans. Alphonso Lingis. The Hague: Martinus Niyhoft, 1961. OBBE De Uévasion. Paris: Fata Morgana, 1982. Ethique et mfini. 1982. Panis: Livre de poche, 1996. Ethics and Infinity. Trans. Richard A. Cohen. Pittsburgh: Duquesne Unnversity Press, 1985. Autrement que savoir. Paris: Osiris, 1986.

Time and the Other. Trans. Richard A. Cohen. Pittsburgh: Duquesne University Press, 1987. Totalité et Infini: Essai sur Vextériorité. 1961. Paris: Le Livre de Poche, 1987. De Texistence a Uexistant. 2nd ed. Paris: L’édition du poche, 1990.

Nine Talmudic Readings. Trans, Annette Aronowicz. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1990. Entre nous: Essates sur le penser-a-lautre. 1991. Paris: Livre de Poche, 1993.

De Dieu qui vient a Lidée. 2nd ed, Paris: Vrin, 1992. Dieu, la mort et le temps. Paris: Grasset, 1993,

254 SELECT BIBLIOGRAPHY Outside the Subject. Trans. Michael B. Smith. London: Athlone Press, 1993. En décowvrant Vexistence avec Husserl et Heidegger. 5th ed. Paris: Vrin, 1994. LDEHH Liberté eb commandement. Paris: Fata Morgana, 1994.

Le temps et Uautre, 5th ed. Paris: Presses Universitaires de France, 1994. TA

The Theory of Intuition in Husserl’s Phenomenology. Trans. André Ori-

anne. 2nd ed. Evanston: Northwestern University Press, 1995,

PIHP Basic Phitosophical Writings. Ed. Adriaan Peperzak, Simon Crit-

chley, and Robert Bernasconi. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1996.

Proper Names. ‘Vrans. Michael B. Smith. London: Athlone Press, 1996. PN Transcendence and Intellgibilité. Geneva: Labor et Fides, 1996. Discovering Existence with Husserl. Trans. Richard A. Cohen and Michael B. Smith. Evanston: Northwestern University Press, 1998. Entre Nous: On Thinking-of-the-Other. Trans. Michael B. Smith and Barbara Harshav. New York: Columbia University Press, 1998.

SELECTED ESSAYS BY EMMANUEL LEVINAS

“Jacques Derrida: Tout Autrement.”” Noms Propres. Paris: Fata Mor-

gana, 1976. 65-72, “Beyond [ntentionality.” Philosophy in France Today. Ed. A. Mon-

tefiore. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1983. 100115.

“Bad Conscience and the Inexorable.” Face to Face with Levinas. Ed. Richard A. Cohen. Albany: SUNY Press, 1986. 35-40. “The Trace of the Other” Deconstruction in Context. Ed. Mark C. Taylor. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1986, 345-59. TO “God and Philosophy.” Trans. Richard A. Cohen and Alphonso Lingis. The Levinas Reader. Hd. Sean Hand. Oxford: Blackwell, 1989. 166-89. GP “1933-1934: Thoughts on National Socialism: Reflections on the Philosophy of Hitlerism.” Trans. Sean Hand. Critical Inquiry 17 (1990-91): 62-71.

SELECT BIBLIOGRAPHY 259 ‘Philosophy and Awakening.” Who Comes After the Subject? Ed. Eduardo Cadava, Peter Connor, and Jean-Luc Nancy. New York: Routledge, 1991. 206-16. “Ethics As First Philosophy.” The Continental Philosophy Reader. Ed.

Richard Kearney and Mara Rainwater. London: Routledge, 1995, 124-35.

OTHER WORKS

Adorno, Theodor W. Aesthetic Theory. Trans. Robert Hullot-Kentor. London: Athlone Press, 1997. Alliez, Eric. De l'impossililité de la phénoménologie: Sur la philosophie francaise contemporaine. Paris: Vrin, 1995. Balthasar, Hans Urs von. The Glory of the Lord: A Theological Aesthetics. Vol. 1, Seeing the Form. Trans. Erasmo Leiva-Merikakis. 2nd

ed. San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 1982. GL ————. The Glory of the Lord: A Theological Aesthetics. Vol. 2, Studies

in Theological Style: Clerical Style. Trans. Andrew Louth, Francis

McDonagh, and Brian McNeil, C.R.V. San Francisco: [gnatius Press, 1984. ——. The Glory of the Lord: A Theological Aesthetics. Vol. 3, Studies in Theological Style: Lay Styles. Trans. Andrew Louth, John Sa-

ward, Martin Simon and Rowan Williams. San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 1984. ———.. The Glory of the Lord: A Theological Aesthetics. Vol. 4, The Realm of Metaphysics in Antiquity. Trans. Brian McNeil, C.R.V.,

Andrew Louth, John Saward, Rowan Williams, and Oliver Davies. San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 1989. ——.. The Glory of the Lord: A Theological Aesthetics. Vol. 5, The Realm of Metaphysics in the Modern Age. Trans. Oliver Davies, An-

drew Louth, Brian McNeil, C.R.V., John Saward, and Rowan Williams. San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 1991. ——. The Glory of the Lord: A Theological Aesthetics. Vol. 6, Theology:

The Old Covenant. Trans. Brian McNeil, C.R.V., and Erasmo Leiva-Merikakis. San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 1991. ——. The Glory of the Lord: A Theological Aesthetics. Vol. 7, Theology:

the New Covenant. Trans. Brian McNeil, C.R.V. San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 1990. GL7

290 SELECT BIBLIOGRAPHY ——. New hlucadations, Trans. Mary Theresilde Skerry. San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 1986. ———.. Mystertum Paschale, Trans. Aidan Nichols, O.P. Grand Rap-

ids, Mich.: Eerdmans, 1990. MP ———. Theodrama: IV: The Action. Trans. Graham Harrison. San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 1992. ——. The theology of Karl Barth: Exposition and Interpretation. Trans. Edward T. Oakes, S.J. San Francisco: Communio Books— Ignatius Press, 1992. ———. My Work in Retrospect. Trans. Brian McNeil, C.R.V., et al. San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 1993. Bataille, Georges. The Accursed Share: An Essay an General Economy,

Trans. Robert Hurley. Vol. 1, Consumption. New York: Zone Books, 1988.

Beardsworth, Richard. Derrida and the Political. London: Routledge, 1996. Belk, Russell W. “The Perfect Gift.” Gift-Giving: A Research Anthol-

ogy. Ed. Cele Otnes and Richard F. Beltramini. Bowling Green. Ohio: Bowling Green State University Popular Press, 1996. 58— 94, PG Benveniste, Emile. Prohlémes de linguistique générale. Paris: Gallimard, 1966. PLG Bernasconi, Robert. “Levinas: Philosophy and Beyond.” Philosophy and Non-Philosophy since Merleau-Ponty. Ed. Hugh J. Silverman. New York: Routledge, 1988. 232-58. Bernasconi, Robert, and Simon Critchley, eds. Re-reading Levinas, Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1991. Blanchot, Maurice. Thomas UVObscur. New ed. Paris: Gallitnard, 1950.

——.. The Space of Literature. Trans. Ann Smock. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1982. SZ

——. thomas the Obscure. Trans. Robert Lamberton. New York: Station Hill Press, 1988. ——.. The Infinite Conversation. Trans. Susan Hanson. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1993. IC

——.. the Writing af the Disaster. Trans. Ann Smock. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1995. WOD Blond, Phillip, ed. Post-Secular Philosophy: Between Philosophy and Theology. London: Routledge, 1998. PSP

SELECT BIBLIOGRAPHY 257 Bourdieu, Pierre. The Field of Cultural Production: Essays on Art and Literature. Oxford: Polity-Blackwell, 1993.

Cadava, Eduardo, Peter Connor, and Jean-Luc Nancy, eds. Whe Comes After the Subject? London: Routledge, 1991. WCAS

Caputo, John D. Heidegger and Aquinas: An Essay on Overcoming Metaphysics. New York: Fordham University Press, 1982. —_— . The Mystical Element in Heidegger’s Thought. New York: Ford-

ham University Press, 1986.

———. Radical Hermeneutics. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1987. RH ——., Against Ethics. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1993.

——. Demythologizing Heidegger. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1993. DH ——_— , ed. Deconstruction in a Nutshell: A Conversation with Jacques

Derrida. New York: Fordham University Press, 1997. DN ——. The Prayers and Tears of Jacques Derrida: Religion without Reiz-

gion. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1997. PTJD Caputo, fohn D., and Michael J. Scanlon, eds. Ged, the Gift, and Postmodernism. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1999. GGP

Carlson, Thomas A. Indiscretion: Finitude and the Naming of God. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1999. Chalier, Catherine, and Miguel Abensour, eds. kmmanuel Levinas. Cahier de L’ Herne. Paris: L’Herne, 1991. Cohen, Richard A., ed. Face to Face with Levinas, Albany: SUNY Press, 1986.

Colette, Jacques. “Phénoménologie et métaphysique.”” Critique 548-49 (January—February 1993): 56-73. Comay, Rebecca. “Gifts without Presents: Economies of ‘Expertence’ in Bataille and Heidegger.” Yale French Studies 78 (1990): 66-89, GWP Critchley, Simon. The Ethics of Deconstruction: Derrida and Levinas. Oxford: Blackwell, 1992. EDDL

——., “Derrida: Private Ironist or Public Liberal?” Deconstrisefion and Pragmatism. Ed. Chantal Mouffe. London: Routledge, 1996. 19-40. Critchley, Simon, and Peter Dews, eds. Deconstructing Suljectivities. Albany: SUNY Press, 1996. DS

258 SELECT BIBLIOGRAPHY Davis, Colin, Levinas: An Introduction. Cambridge: Polity Press, L996. LAT

Dilthey, Wilhelm. “The Understanding of Other Persons and Thetr Expressions of Life” (1910). Descriptive Psychology and His-

torical Understanding. Trans. Kenneth L. Heiges. The Hague: Martinus Nijhoff, 1977. 121-44. Gascheé, Rodolphe. The Tain of the Mirror: Derrida and the Philosophy of Reflection. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1986. ———. Inventions of Difference: On Jacques Derrida. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1994. IDJD

Greisch, Jean. “L’herméneutique dans la ‘phénoménologie comme telle.’ ” Revue de Métaphysique et de Morale 96, no. 1 (1991): 43-63. HPT —-——. “Index sui et non dati.” Transversalités: Revue de L’ Institut Catholique de Pars 70 (April-June 1999): 27-54. Hand, Sean, ed. The Levinas Reader. Oxford: Blackwell, 1989. Hart, Kevin. The Trespass of the Sign. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1989. 7S ——. Kev. of The Gift of Death, by Jacques Derrida. Modern Theology 12, no. 4 (1996): 495-96.

—.. Introduction to “How to Avoid Speaking.” The Postmodern Cod: A Theological Reader. Ed. Graham Ward. Oxford: Blackwell, 1997. 159-67. LHAS

———.. “The Experience of Poetry.” Boxkite: A Journal of Poetry and Poetics 2 (1998): 285-304. EP ———.. “Jacques Derrida: The God Effect.”” Post-Secular Philosophy:

Between Philosophy and Theology. Ed. Phillip Blond. London: Routledge, 1998. 259-80. JDGE

——.. “Shared Silence.” Rev. of Frendship, by Maurice Blanchot, and Politics of Friendship, by Jacques Derrida. Australian’s Review of Books 3, no. 2 (1998): 8-9. ———.. The Dark Gaze: Maurice Blanchot and Friends. [forthcoming]

Heidegger, Martin. Existence and Beng. Trans. R. F. C. Hull and Alan Crick. 2nd ed. London: Vision, 1956. —_—.. being and Time. Trans. John Macquarrie and Edward Robinson, Oxford; Blackwell, 1962. BT ——.. What Is Called Thinking? Trans. J]. Glenn Gray. New York: Harper and Row, 1968. WOT

SELECT BIBLIOGRAPHY 259 —_—. The f'ssence of Reasons. Trans. Terence Malick. Evanston: Northwestern University Press, 1969. —_—.. Identity and Difference. Trans. Joan Stambaugh. New York: Harper and Row, 19069.

——.. Poetry, Language, Thought. Trans. Albert Hofstadter. New York: Harper and Row, 1971. —_——. ‘Time and Being.” On Time and Being. Trans. Joan Stambaugh. New York: Harper and Row, 1972. TB ———. The Piety of Thinking. Trans. and ed, James G. Hart and John C. Maraldo. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1976. ——. The Question Concerning Technology and Other Essays. Trans. William Lovett. New York: Garland, 1977. —_—§. Basic Problems of Phenomenology. Trans. Albert Hotstadter.

Rev. ed. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1982. BPP ———.. History of the Concept of Time. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1985. ——.. The Principle of Reason. Trans. Reginald Lilly. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1991. PR ——.. “Letter on Humanism.” Basic Writings: Martin Heidegger. Rev. ed. by David Farrell Krell. London: Routledge, 1993. 21765. LA ———. “What Is Metaphysics?” Basic Writings: Martin Heidegger. Rev. ed. by David Farrell Krell. London: Routledge, 1993. 93110.

——. The Fundamental Concepts of Metaphysics. Trans. William McNeill and Nicholas Walker. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1995.

——. Being and Time. Trans. Joan Stambaugh. Albany: SUNY Press, 1996. Henry, Michel. L essence de la manifestation. Paris: Presses Universttatres de France, 1963. ———.. Phénoménologie maténelle. Paris; Presses Universitaires de France, 1990.

——. “Quatre principes de la phénoménologie.”” Revue de Métaphysique et de Morale 96, no. 1 (1991): 3-26. OPP

Holzer, Vincent. “Phénoménotogie radicale et phénoméne de révélation. Jean-Luc Marion, Etant donné. Essai d’une phénomeénologie de la donation.” Trensversalités: Revue de L’Institut Catholique de Paris 70 (April-June 1999): 55-68. PRPR

260) SELECT BIBI LOGRAPHY Husserl, Edmund. The idea of Phenomenology. Trans. William P. Als-

ton and George Nakhnikian. The Hague: Martinus Nijhoff, 1964, IP ———. “Philosophy As a Rigorous Science.’ Phenomenology and the Crisis of Philosophy. Trans. Quentin Lauer. New York: Harper and Row, 1965. ———.. Cartesian Meditations. Trans. Dorion Cairns. The Hague: Martinus Nijhoff, 1970. CM ———.. Ideas: General Introduction to Pure Phenomenology. Vol. 1. Trans. W. R. Boyce Gibson, London: Allen and Unwin, 1972. 1 Hyde, W. Lewis. The Gift: Imagination and the Erotic Life of Property.

New York: Random House, 1983. GJELP Ingraffia, Brian D. Postmodern Theory and Biblical Theology, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1995. Janicaud, Dominique. Le teurnant théologique de la phénoménologie francaise. Combas: Editions de |’éclat, 1991. TTPF

——. La phénoménologie éclalée. Combas: Editions de léclat, 1998.

Janicaud, Dominique, Jean-Francois Courtine, Jean-Louis Chrétien, Michel Henry, Jean-Luc Marion, and Paul Ricoeur. Phenemenology and the “Theological Turn”: The French Debate. New York:

Fordham University Press, 2000. Kant, Immanuel. Religion within the Limits of Reason Alone. Trans. Greene and Hudson. New York: Harper, 1960. ———. The Conflict of the Faculties. New York: Abaris, 1979. Kearney, Richard. Dialogues with Contemporary Continental Thinkers.

Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1984. DCCT ——.. “Derrida’s Ethical Return.” Working Through Derrida. Ed.

Gary B. Madison. Evanston: Northwestern University Press, 1993. 28-50. Kohak, Erazim. /dea and Experience. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1978. Komter, Aafke E., ed. The Gift: An Interdisciplinary Perspective. Am-

sterdam: Amsterdam University Press, 1996. Kovacs, George. The Question of God in Heidegger’s Phenomenology.

Evanston: Northwestern University Press, 1990.

Krell, David Farrell. “General Introduction: The Question of Being.” Basic Writings: Martin Heidegger. Rev. ed. by David Far-

rell Krell. London: Routledge, 1993, 3-35.

SELECT BIB] TOGRAPHY 206] Lacoue-Labarthe, Philippe. £ tmitation des modernes, Paris: Galilée, 1986.

Laruelle, Francois. “L’Appel etle Phénoméne.” Revue de Métaphysique et de Morale 96, no. 1 (1991): 27-41. AP Lescourret, Marie-Anne. Emmanuel Levinas. Paris: Flammarion, 1994.

Liewelyn, John. Emmanuel Levinas: The Genealogy of [thics. London:

Roudedge, 1995. ELGE Lukacher, Ned. Premal Scenes. IUhaca: Cornell University Press, 1986. Lyotard, Jean Francois. The Postmodern Explained to Children. 'Vrans.

Don Barry et al. Sydney: Power Publications, 1992. Macquarrie, John. Heidegger and Christianity. London: SCM Press, 1994. HC Madder, Clive. “Blanchot’s Neutral Space: A Negative Theology.” Pacifica 9, no. 2 June 1996): 175-84. Martis, John. “The Debate between Levinas in ‘God and Philoso-

phy’ and Derrida in ‘Violence and Metaphysics’ Investigated through Levinas’ Concept of the _Immemorial Past.” Unpublished essay, 1994.

——. “Postmodernism and God As Giver.” The Way 36 (July 1996): 236-43. Mauss, Marcel. The Gift: The Form and Reason for kxchange in Archaic Societies. Trans. W. D. Halls. London: Routledge, 1990. GFREAS

McKenna, William R., and J. Claude Evans, eds. Derrida and Phenomenology. Dordrecht: Kluwer Academic, 1995. Merleau-Ponty, Maurice. “The Primacy of Perception and Its Philosophical Consequences.” Readings in Exisiential Phenomenology.

Ed. N. M. Lawrence et al. Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice Hail, 1967. 31-54. Milbank, John. Theology and Sonal Theory. Oxtord: Blackwell, 1990.

———. “Can a Gilt Be Given?” Rethinking Metaphysics. Ed. L. Gregory Jones and Stephen E. Fowl, Oxford: Blackwell, 1995. 119-61. CGG ——.. "Stories of Sacrifice: From Wellhausen to Girard.” Theory, Culture, and Society 12, no. 4 (November 1995): 15-46. —-——-. “Socialism of the Gift, Socialism by Grace.” New Blackfrars 77.910 (1996): 532-48. ———-. The Ward Made Strange. Oxford: Blackwell, 1997.

262 SELECT BIBLIOGRAPHY Miller, Jerome A. In the Throe of Wonder: Intimations of the Sacred in a Post-Modern World. Albany: SUNY Press, 1992. Nancy, Jean-Luc. The Sense of the World. Trans. Jeffrey S. Librett.

Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1997. O'Donnell, John., S.J. Hans Urs von Balthasar. London: Geoffrey Chapman, 1992. O'Leary, Joseph S. Questioning Back: The Overcoming of Metaphysics

in the Christian Tradition, Minneapolis: Seabury, 1985. ——.. “Theological Resonances of Der Satz vom Grund.” Martin Heidegger: Critical Assessments. ¥.d. Christopher Macann. London: Routledge, 1992. 214-56. TRSG ——.. La vérité chrétienne a Vage du pluralisme religieux. Paris; Les Editions du Cerf, 1994. —_—. Religious Pluralism and Christian Truth. Rev. ed. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 1996. RPCT Otnes, Cele, and Richard F. Beltramini, eds. Gift-Giving: A Research Anthology. Bowling Green, Ohio: Bowling Green State University Popular Press, 1996. Ott, Hugo. Martin Heidegger: A Political Life. Trans. Allan Blunden. London: Fontana, 1994. Peperzak, Adriaan T. To the Other: An Introduction to the Philosophy of Emmanuel Levinas. West Lafayette, Ind.: Purdue University Press, 1993. TTO ——, ed. Ethics As First Philosophy. New York: Routledge, 1995. ———. Beyond: The Philosophy of Emmanuel Levinas. Evanston: Northwestern University Press, 1997. B Poirié, Francois. Emmanuel Levinas: Qui étes-vous? Lyon: La Manafacture, 1987. Rabatc, Jean-Michel, and Michael Wetzel, eds. L éthique du don: Jacques Derrida et la pensée du don. Colloque de Royaumont décembre

1990. Paris: Transition, 1992. Raheja, Gloria Goodwin. The Poison in the Gift: Ritual, Prestation, and the Dominant Caste in a North Indian Village. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1988. PG

Rahner, Karl. loundations of Christian Faith. Trans. William V. Dych. 1976. New York: Crossroad, 1992. Richardson, William J., S.J. Heidegger: Through Phenomenology to thought. The Hague: Martinus Nijhoff, 1963. HTPT

Richir, Marc. “Phénoméne et Infini.” Emmanuel Levinas. Ed.

SELECT BIBLIOGRAPHY 263 Catherine Chalier and Miguel Abensour. Cahier de L’ Herne. Paris: |. Herne, 1991. 241-61. Ricoeur, Paul. Husserl: An Analysis of His Phenomenology. Trans. Ed-

ward G. Ballard and Lester E. Embree. Evanston: Northwestern University Press, 1967. HAP ———. Freud and Philosophy: An Essay on Interpretation, Trans. Denis Savage. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1970. —_——.. The Conflict of Interpretations. Evanston: Northwestern Untversity Press, 1974.

———., Hermeneutics and the Human Sriences. Trans. John B. Thompson, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1981. —_— . “Expérience et langage dans le discours religieux.” JeanFrancois Courtine, Jean-Louis Chrétien, Michel Henry, feanLuc Marion, and Paul Ricoeur. Phénoménologie et théologze. Paris:

Criterion, 1992. 15-38. LDR —_——. Oneself As Another. Trans. Kathleen Blamey. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1992.

—_——. Figuring the Sacred. Trans. David Pellauer. Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1995. Sahlins, Marshall. Stone Age Economics. Chicago: Aldine Atherton, 1972. Schrift, Alan D., ed. The Logic of the Gift: Toward an Ethic of Generos-

ily. New York: Routledge, 1997. Scola, Angelo. Hans Urs von Balthasar: A Theological Style. Grand Rapids, Mich.: Eerdmans, 1995. Seyhan, Azade. Representation and Its Discontents. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1992.

Silverman, Hugh J., ed. Derrida and Deconstruction. New York: Routledge, [989. Steiner, George. Herdegger. 2nd ed. London: Fontana, 1992. Taylor, Mark C. Hrring: A Postmodern A/Theology. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1984. ———.. Altarity. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1987. Tracy, David. Pluradity and Ambiguity: Hermeneutics, Religion, Hope. London: SGM Press, 1987. ———. On Naming the Present: God, Hermeneutics, and Church. Maryknoll, N_¥.: Orbis, 1994.

Ward, Graham. “Why Is Derrida Important for Theology?” Theology 95.766 (1992): 263-69.

264 SELECT BIBLIOGRAPLIY ——.. Barth, Derrida, and the Language of Theology. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1995. ———,, ed. Special issue on Jean-Luc Marion's God Without Being. New Blackfrars 76.895 (1995). ——. Theology and Contemporary Critical Theory. London: Macmillan, 1996.

———, ed. The Postmodern God: A Theological Reader. Oxtord: Blackwell, 1997.

———. “The Theological Project of Jean-Luc Marion.” Past-Secular Philosophy: Between Philosophy and Theology. Kd. Phillip Blond.

London: Routledge, 1998. 229-39. Yan, Yunxiang. The Flow of Gifis: Reciprocity and Social Networks in a

Chinese Village. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1996. #G

Adorno, Theodor W., 78 R34, GE, 95, 101, 104-6, 113, 121,

Alliez, Eric, 104 123-29, 131-34, 137, 138, 144, 146, Angelus Silesius, 231 149, 152, 154-56, 158-59, 172, 173, Anselm, 164-65, 24] 175, 178, 179-82, 184-208, 210-16,

Audi, Robert, 71 918-39, 249-47 Descartes, René, 20, 29, 34, 70, 84, 86, Balthasar, Hans Urs von, 107, 147, 104, 121, 122, 126, 140, 144, 164,

161, 163, 166, 175-76, 175, 237 165

Basil of Caesarea, 170 Dews, Peter, 61 Bataille, Georges, 6, 38, 124 Dionysius. See Denys the Areopagite Baudelaire, Charles, 119, 194, 201—2, Dilthey, Wilhelm, 23

205, 213 Dostoevsky, Fyodor, 12

Beardsworth, Richard, 79 Belk, Russell, 2. 4 Firth, Raymond, 14

Bennington, Géotirey, 66 Freud, Sigmund, 14, 202 Benveniste, Emile, 10-11 ; Gasché, Rodolphe, 38, 43, 195

Bernascoru, Robert, 68, 215 Greisch. lean. 81. 108. 113. 138. 154 Blanchot, Maurice, 31, 42-43, 44,58, Grelseh, Jean, 81, 108, 115, 298, 1o

59, 63, 69, 129, 174, 224 Hand, Sean, 46 Blond, Philip, 173 _ Hart, Kevin, 24-25, 54, 63, 78-79, 191, Brentano, Franz, 46, 43 914-15, 997 9B 94g | 32] ; 35 94]. Cadava, Eduardo, 61 ne Hegel. G. WR, 62, 121 Caputo, John D., 12, 27, 28, 31, 37, 39, Heidegger, Martin, 26-45, 51-52, 55—-

185, 126, 198, 3000, 205, 209 | 5 i 57, 59, 60, 61-62, 63, 65, 74, 76, 77,

Oe ie ee cone cee ae 81-82, 84-93, 95-98, 101-3, 105,

_214, 215, 225, 236, 237, 242 108-12, 116-19, 121-22, 127, 154,

Carlson, Thomas A., 115, 184, 243 179, 186, 217, 218, 229, 295, 239,

Chauvet, Louis-Mane, 102 996

Ip 108, 115, 116, 145

Chrénen, Jean-Louis, 102, 104, LO0&, Henry, Michel, 81, 94, 99, 100, 102,

Colette, Jacques, 104 Holzer, Vincent, 157, 158 Comay, Rebecca, 38 Hopkins, Gerard Manley, 213

Courtine, Jean-Frang¢ois, 108, 116 Husserl, Edmund, 19-29, 45-56, 61, Critchley, Simon, 61, 75, 186, 206 62, 63, 74, 76, 8I-&G, 91, 94-98.

. . 102, 108, 116-18, 121-25, 141, 144-

Davis, Colin, 55, 58 45, 148, 154, 158, 173, 191, 237 Denys the Areopagite, 78, 121, 227, Hyde, Lewis, 14-15 229, 243, 245

Derrida, Jacques, x—x1, 6-12, 14-18, Janicaud, Dominique, 81, 102-4, 106, 19, 24-27, 31-32, 36, 38-44, 46, 47, 113, 116, 127, 146, 153-54, 156-59,

53, 61-62, 65~67, 70-72, 75-80, 82, 172, 246

266 INDEX Kant, Immanuel, 34, 54, 70-71, 76,84, 9 Nancy, Jean-Luc, 61, 207

96, 121, 141-45, 1H5-#B, 222 Nicholas of Cusa, 243

Kearney, Richard, 16, 39, 75, 160,173 Nietzsche, Friedrich, 82, 16] Kierkegaard, Seren, 186, 211, 219, 220

Komter, Aafke E., 5 O'Leary, Joseph 8., 28-29, 40, 97, 108, 160, 170

Lacoste, Jean-Yves, 10? Pascal, Blaise, 104 Laruelle, Frangois, 98-1 Q1, 106, 113 Peperzak, Adriaan, 45-46, 48-57, 59,

Leibniz, Gottfried, 141 62. 67

Lescourret, Maric-Anne, 46 Pilato, a9 4A 74, 935 Levinas, Emmanuel, 11-12, 23, 30-31, Pseucdo-Dionysius. See Denys the Areo-

39, 44, 45-80, 81, 85, 91, 93, G5, 99, pagite , ) 100, 1O1-3, 107, 121, 144, 145, 151, :

159, 163, 164, 165, 167, 173-74, 183, 9 Raheja, Gloria Goodwin, 9-10 200, 205-7, 209, 210, 215, 218, 222, Rahner, Karl, 147, 179, 235

224, 229, 236-37, 247 Richir, Marc, 55

Levi-Strauss, Claude, 14 Ricocur, Paul, 22-23, 63, 108, 124, Llewelyn, John, 49, 52-54, 56-57, 62 142, 146, 151-52, 155, 157, 245

Macquarrie, John, 30, 33 Sahiins, Marshall, ! 4-15

, Seyhan, Azade, 48

Marion, Jean-Luc, xi, 18, 19, 23, 30, 45, Schrift, Alan D., 16-17

59, 68, 78-80, 81-114, 115-52, 153- ;

83, 184, 216, 2229, 224, 227-28, 234, Thomas Aquinas, 138 237%, 242-47

Mauss, Marcel, 12-15, 125, 186, Wahl, Jean, 60

193-94 Ward, Graham, 78, 145, 173, 227-28

Milbank, John, 16-17, 172-74, 178- Willgenstein, Ludwig, 161 80, 24?

Moore, Sebastian, 247 Yan, Yunxiang, 14

abandoned, the, 149 causality/cause, 124, 129, 133-39,

absolution, 214 180-82, E8Y

acceptance of the gift, 1-4, 37, 130, Christ, Jesus, ix, 106, 130, 147, 148,

134,179, 210 167, 168, 170, 175-76, 179, 209, alms, 3, 219 218-20 alterity, 24, 40, 65-69, 91, 101, 107, cognition, immanent, 20 207, 236 concepl/s, 76: as icons or idols, 161; as altruusm, 5 icon, 164 anamorphosis, 139, 140 consciousness, 19-28, 45-53, 58-65, apophatic/apophatism, 148, 230 68-71, 81-83, 85, 96, 103, 126, 145, aporia/aporetic, 7, 79, 124, 127, 133, 190-92, 195-96; phenomenologi181, 191, 209, 210, 212, 215, 225, cally reduced, 24; primacy of, 45 932, 934 238, 242, 944 246-47; conversion, 72-74, 189-83, 207, 233 definition, 7; resolution by decision, counter-intention /counter-

7 intentionality, 172, 174

appropriation, 35-36, 38, 39, 42, 44, Cross, 112, 165, 170, 172; as icon, 169

89, 111-12 curved space, 68-69, 76, 107, 224

224 917 ;

arch-revelauion, 102

as much reduction, as much given- death, 24-95. 41, 60). 112, 120-22, 125.

ness, 115 128, 146, 149, 161, 194-95, 198,

asymmetry /asyminetrical, 68-69, 208, 901, 215-22, 227, 230, 239: as gifl,

atiributary, 149-50 debt, 1, 8, 16-17, 31, 39, 125, 130,

author, 201 132-35, 176, 214, 247; anterior, 183 auto-allection, 94, 145 decision, 7, 132-33, 135-36, 181, 210, 930, 239-33, 247

being/ Being, 24, 26-43, 51, 52, 54, deconstruction, 40, 75, 77, 78, 100, 56-66, 68-71, 73. 74, 76-78, R3-84, 121, 210, 227, 229, 230, 249, 243 85-87, 89-43, 94-97, 101-2, 105- delay, 16, 17, 24, 26, 125, 193 TL, 113, 115-18, 12%. Tba, 161, 179, de-nominating /de-nomination,

180, 192, 222 BOR, 299, B35, P44 O43 45

bodiliness, 62, 03, 144 de-propriation, 49 body, 44, 53, 219 desert, 234-36 boredom, 86-92 desirc, 42, 68, 72, 73, 74, 199, 200, 207, P55, 247

ca donne, 31, 32,59, 109, 111,117, 204 devoted one, 149-50 call/Call, 64, 89, 91, 95, 96, 98-102, diachrony, 63-65, 67 103-5, 107-8, 150-51, 179, 215, differance, 24, 26, 27, 44, 77, 79, 105,

222-26, 238, 245 117, 125, 134, 172, 186, 193-97,

caller/Caller, 92, 101, 106, 151, 173 202, 227-30; condition of possibility

categorical imperative, 76, 222 and impossibility for thinking, 43

268 INDEX disseminanion, 26, 105, 193, 194, 201, 22, 46, 191; Erlebais, 22, 46, 47, 191;

202, 213 Intentional, 23: non-intentional, 23,

distance, 30, 65, 68, 69, 72, 101, 106, 24, 47. See also mtentionality 107, 108, 109, 110, 112, 113, 144, exposure, 67 160, 161, 165, 166, 170, 171, 172, expropriation, 38, 109, 112

178, 179, 185. 236 exteriority, 189, 190

donor, 4, 8, 18, 15, 116, 124, 126, 199,

130, 131, 132, 133, 134, 135,136, face, the, 16, 54, 66-68, 72, 73, 75, 76, 137, 181, 182, 183, 188, 190, 195, 79, 80, 91, 113, 139, 145, 148, 150, 196, 197, 204, 205, 209, 215, 216 160, 162-65, 167-69, 173, 174, 183,

double dissymmetry, 69, 174, 224 O35

doubt, 20 faith, ix, 69, 74, 78, 181, 199, 217, 232, 234, 236, 241, 247; condition of pos-

economy, 6, 17, 68, 78, 124, 125, 129, sibility for, 78 136, 137, 187. 188, 189, 190, 193, flesh, 145, 148, 171 204, 209, 215, 218; general, 6, 7; of forgetting, 15, 42, 190-93 the unconscious, 14; restricted, 5, forgiveness, 2, 202, 213, 214

7,9 form: unformed and informed, 139 encomium, 228 205, 224, 247

embodied, 55, 237 freedom, 2, 5, 6, 58, 65, 67, 68, 182,

enigma, 68, 78 fricndship, 2, 65, 136, 224, 225

enjoyment, 50 future, 7, 56, 60, 63, 65, 143, 188, 199, ennui, 87, 88, 90, 92, 93, 178 200, 209, 215, 220, 225, 230, 234,

epiphany, 54, 66, 67, 175, 176 235 Pregnis, 29, 35, 36, 38, 39, 40, 41, 42,

43, 89, 90, 109, 110, 118, 148, 173, gap, 83, 104, 105, 112, 115, 156, 172,

193; as event of Appropriation, 35 175, 178, 237, 242 es gibt, 29, 30-36, 40-44, 59, 98, 108, gathering, 40 110-13, 117, 122, 154, 193, 231; gare, 145, 147, 162-65, 171, 244 there is/it gives/il y a, 30; versus Gegebenhert, 82, 97, 116, 123, 137, 154,

khora, 31 155

ethics, 40, 57, 72, 74, 75, 76, 210-13, generosity, 1, 2,9, 12, 15, 16, 31, 43,

22] 44,50, 130, 201, 2902, 210, 237

event, 140, 143, 145, 147, 171, 192, gilt/Gift, , ix—xi, 1-19, 24, 35-38, 40-

231, 232, 234; gift, 191 4? 44, 59, 81, 93, 105, 107, 169-14,

evidence / Furdenz, 21, 25, 51 118, 122-38, 145, 150, 152-58, 16,

ex-appropriation, 194 174, 176-210, 213-30, 232, 237-39, excess, 6, 11, 77, 96, 126, 142, 143, 241-43, 246, 247; abandoned, 130; 149, 150, 172, 173, 174, 175, 180, and time, 185; anonymous, 134,

204, 242; criuque of, 173 150; anterior, 133, 135; as a present,

excessiveness, 164 2, 156; as capacity to give, 183; as

exchange, 5, 8, 13-17, 112, 125, 127, condition of present given, 185; as 129, 132, 137, 138, 179, 187, 188, condition of the given, 128; as deci-

201, 206, 214, 219 sion, 13%; as lost, 182; as madness,

experience, 22—23, 30, 46-47, 49-50, 199; as poison, 9; as present, 3; as 54, 58-59, 60, 65, 73, 94, 139, [41- pure loss, 129; as quasi-Lranscenden44, 169, 187, 191-93, 220, 221, 224- tal, 186; as response to giftedness, 26, 230, 235-39, 241, 243: aesthetic, 133: as simulacrum, 9; as something 142; aporetic, 7, 210, 215, 232, 246; determinate, 185; conditions of poscounter-experience, 144; Erfahrung, sibility and impossibility, 8, 9; defi-

INDEX 29 nition, 1, 4; delay and non-identical — hate, 125, 136, 219

repetiuon, 16; ctymological consid- height, 68 erations, 9-11; exchange, 13; from hermeneutic/hermeneutics, 89, 95, elsewhere, 138, 181; givable, 131; in 99, 103, 136, 158, 159, 174, 184, 241

purified gift-exchange, 16; inten- holiness, 67, 143 ion, 2: misunderstood, 126: neces- Holy. 168-70

sary return, 10; neon- horizon /s, 5, 19, 24, 32, 38, 39, 41, 56, phenomenological, 18; obligatory, 57, 74, 76, 78, 84, 92, 93, 96, 97, 104, 11: of beg, 35; phenomenological, 7, 108, 110, £13, 117, 118, 124, 137; poles of, ISL; pure, x; refused, 129, 133, 134, 136, 13°7, 149-45, 125, 126; return, 5; revelation as, 81; 147, 155, 158, 159, 164, 169, 171, secret, 3; suspension of, 136; wuth, 215, 22), 225, P34, 235, 244: inter9; unappreciated, 126; undecidable, rupuion of, 234

133; versus gift-obyect, 131 hospitality, 11, 12: as gift, 210; condi-

gift-object, 8, 133; ideal, 2 uons of possibility and impossibility, given, 3, 19, 24, 38, 45, 74, 95, 118, 12

121, 122, 138, 149, 154, 166, 188. hyperessential/iyperessentiality. 77,

900, 205, 217, 238 78, 228, 2299, 2353

givenness, 2, 4,9, 13, 21, 22,37, 45,51, — hypostasis, 61, 62, 160 74, 81, 82. 85, 8&6, Y?-99, 101, 102, 109, 115-18, 120-29, 135-38, 141, ——«*1, 84. 93, 142, 171

142, 144-46, 148, 149, 154-56. 158, eon, 111, 145, 146, 148, 160-65, 167174, 177, 204, 252: as phenomenal 72,174, 178: and redoubled satura-

ily, 138; degrees of, 141, 146 lion, 148; as saturated giver /Giver, 1, 2,5, 8, 10, 13, 82, 108, phenomenon, 160

110-13, 124, 125, 198, 130,152,134, idea of the infinite /Tnfinite, 70, 71,

139, 159, [55, 173, 174, 178%, 180, 144, 164 181, 196, 197, 201, DADs (sod as, 1x identity, 655: and clifference, ‘{2> versus

giving, ix—x1, 5-6, &, 10, 13-17, 22, 24, self-identity, 61 95, 31~33, 35, 37, 38, 40-42, 82,85, idol, 111, 145, 147, 1O0-05, 1a7-72,

109-18, 121, 127-30, 133-38, 143, 74, 178

144, 148, 150, 166, 176, 178, 179, ily a, 30, 31, 44, 57, 58, 59, 69, 109, 182, 183, 185, 186, 188, 191-95, 198, L)1, ll ?, 173, 142 200, 202, 203, 205-7, 209, 210, 213- — lerty, 66, 72-74 15, 217-19, 226, 232. 947. abyssal, image, 48, 58, 69, 160), 162, 166-69,

Al; God as, 1x; In secret, [98, 215: 208

universal, 130 mmanence/immanent, 20, 21, 36, 47,

God, ix-xi, 16, 17, 21, 30, 34, 44, 54, 66, 70, 72, 94, 99, 102, 116, 137, 138, 60, 61, 69-72, 74, 77-79, 95, 97, 98, 155, 161, 238 G1, 102, 104-8, 110-13, 137, 145, mune morial/immemorsality, 61, 63148. 153-58, 155, 158, 160, 161, 64, 68, 72, 74, 75, 79, 83, 107, 135, 163-65, 168, 169, 172-80, 183-85, 174, 185, 190, 192, 195, 196, 217, 189, 197, 206-9, Y 11-16, 978, 298o— 220, 223, 224, 231: as diachronv/as

22, 426-33, 235-438, 241-47 anachronism /as immemorial past,

good beyond beim, 74 63

244, 247 188, 23], 242 grace, 1x, LO8, 175, 214, 246 indebtedness, 132, 133, 134, 182, 183 goodness, &, 72, 73, 74, 75, 176, 239, Impossible, the, 7, 79, 1-44, 181, 184,

gratitude, 5, 8, 17, 38, 89, 129 Infinite,’ Infinite, 5, 56, 60, 69. 70. 7].

ground, 29, 34, 41, 57, 72, 76, 139, 72, 74, #4, 75, TR, 95, 145, 164, 165,

148, 173, 182, 198 171, 183

270 INDEX infinity/ Infinity, 54, 63, 65, 66, 70-74, conditions of possibility and impos-

77, 79, 164, 203, 238 sibility for, 26

insomnia, 58-59 messiah / messianic /messianism, 198, tention, 162, 171, 174; infinite, 171: 200, 234, 235, 237

without intuition, 27 metaphysics, 27, 28, 34, 39, 40, 56, 60,

intentionality, 22, 23, 44-52, 60, 68, 76, 82, 84, 97, 98, 10], 103, 104, 109, 70, 71, 91, 126, 142, 150, 164, 165, 116, 119, 158, 159, 161, 163, 227, 174, 244; affective/ practical /aes- 229, 243, 244: Levinasian, 56, 60: of thetic/voluntary, 47; as adequation, presence, 244 60: definition, 23: inversion of, 68: moment of madness, 186, 198, 200, reversed, 150, 244: theoretical, 49, 207, 210, 212, 919, Bee

50 mystertum tremendum, 211, 220, 226

interlocuted, the, 91, 93, 101, 104, mysuicism, 180, 229, 238, 242, 245 144,173

interruption, 71, 75,95, 113,159,180, name/Name, 79, 151, 231, 232, 233,

187, 189, 190, 223, 231, 234 245, 244, 245, 246 intersubjectivity, 24, 25, 53, 57 rarcissism, 208-9

intuition, 24, 27, 46, 50,51, 62, 89,85, natural attitude, the, 22, 25, 27, 98, 53,

95, 96, 97, 114, 12], 194, 142, 143, 86 145, 147, 148, 149, 156, 154, 156, negative theology, 69, 78, 79, 226-32, 159, 169, 172, 173, 228; as valuing 233, 242, 243, 245; as deconstruc-

and willing, 51 tion of positive theology, 229

mnvisibility /invisible, 54, 56. 80, 94, neuter, 31, 44 102, 104, 120, 130, 142, 148, 160-71, uoema, 22

181, 237 noesis, 2?

mv, 172; the unseen, 166 nothing, the, 86, 87, 89. 120

judgment, 91, 159 obligation, 1,5, 11,77, 117, 182, 133,

OAS obligatory, 11-13

justice, ix, 17, 57, 69, 77, 200, 210, 224, 210, 214

ontological difference, 37, 39, 43, 86,

khdra, 31, 44, 293, 239-37 93, 110, 118; indifference to, 107

knowledge, 15, 17, 19-22, 29, 49, 51, ontology, 28, 29, 33, 34, 36, 55, 56, 57, 32, 54-56, 60, 61, 63, 65, 74, 96, 108, 60), 68, 70, 83, 84, 92, 99, 104, 179.

113, 162, 166, 172, 174, 176, 199, 233 916, 217, 2920-27, 236, 243: eidetic, onto-theclogy, 39, 98, 161, 189

21; foundation for, 19; transcen- organ donation, 216

dent, 20) origin, 4, 39, 42, 61, 64, 72, 105, 139, 152, 189, 234

langnage, 26, 67, 194, 230, 231] original, the, 166 law, 125, 148, 210, 213, 219, 299, 996, other: autre, 40

290, 238 Oiher, the, 46, 54, 57, 66, 62-66, 68,

life, 94, 120, 125, 136; as gift, 216 69, 72-74, 76, 91, 101, 102, 174, 209, love, ix, 2. 17, 47, 49, 63, 72, 73, 87, 214, 224, 295: autrus, 46 125, 131, 136, 148, 167, 170, 171, otherness, 40, 60, 66, 150, 173, 174,

173, 179, 183, 192, 200, 208, 209, 224 210, 213, 218, 219, 220, 238, 239, otherwise than being, 61, 77, 95, 111,

244, 247; as gift, 208 229

me, 144, 150 paradox, 144; paradox of paradoxes, meaning, 15, 26, 46, 75, 83, 96, 172; 146

INDEX 27] perception, 14, 22, 46, 48, ol, 52, 54, 190, 201, 205, 219, 247; versus ac120, 121, 166, 175, 204; theological, cept, 3

175 recipient, 1-5, 8, 10, 13, 113, 121,

performative, 338, 194, 298 124-26, 129, 130, 132, 134, 135,

phenomena: religious, 146; revelatory, 136, 137, 139, 180, 181, 182, 196, 147, 153, 157, 158, 159; saturated, 201, 204, 205, 207, 209, 215, 216

142 reciprocity, 10, 12, 14, 15, 16, 37, 69,

phenomenality, 86; as gift, 137 125, 129, 137, 179, 188, 206, 219

phenomenological reduction, 20, 21, reconciliation, 136 24, 28, 52, 53, 83, 84, 116, 120,181; reduction, 92-94; to givenness, 11 6ff.;

failure of, 24; Heideggerian, 86 to meaning, versus of meaning, 27 phenomenology: and religion, 141; regard, 148, 168. See also gaze and theology, 146, 148, 157, 158, relationless relation, 54, 66, 188, 197,

177, 184; as bringing to light, 234; 994, 996 critique of, 25, 52; definition, 19; relauonship, ix, x, x1, 1, 13, 31, 35, 38, failure of, 81, 95, 100, 158; Heideg- 40, 43, 45, 46, 50, 57, 59, 64, 65, 67, gcrian, 28ff.; Husserlian, 19{f.; Levi- 68, 69, 72, 76, 78, 110, 111, 114, 136,

nas and, 45f£; hmits of, L53ff.; 154, 160, 165, 179, 187, 188, 190, Marion and, 81-152; method, 192, 195, 208, 212, 221, 294, 296,

stages, 20) 997, 236, 237, 243, 246, 247

phenomenon/ phenomena: given, 23; religion, 72, 78, 141, 157, 227, 233, religious, 141-42, 146; revelatory, 234, 235, 236, 237; as response and

108, 113, 116, 131, 146-48, 153, responsibility, 236 157, 158, P71, 174, 177; saturated, repay/repayment, 13, 37,125 142-52, 157, 159-60, 171-72, 174, representation, 23, 34, 46, 48, 49, 50,

b77, 242-45, 245 52, 53, 62, 67, 94, 95, 107, 121, 142,

pluralism, 40 164, 170, 173; versus having a sense, possibility of the impossible, E44 AQ

prayer, 228, 233, 245 responsibility, 11, 54, 55, 57, 62, 64,

presence, 3, 6, 25, 29, 33, 35, 39, 4E, 65, 67, 68, 69, 73, 74, 76. 77, 101, 46,51, 54, 58, 69, 81, 82, 85, G1, 94, 199 189, 183, 200, 210, 211, 2LY, 95, 96, 105, 109, 127, 128, 156, 158, 913. 9]4, 99], 999 999 994 99h | 170, 180, 201, 204, 229, 230, 238, 936, 937, 939 244, 245; and absence, 26; as per- return, ix, x. 1, 4,5, 6, 8, 9, 10, 13, 15,

sonal, 163; as substantial, 163 16, 17, 34, 38, 59, 64, 77, 85, 105,

presencimg, 36, 39, 81 125, 126, 129, 130, 137, 151, 153,

present, x, 63 178, 179, 182, 183, 186, 187. 188, principle of principles, 95, [4] 194, 195, 201, 202, 205, 206, 207, principle of sufficient reason, 124, 9099, 914, 297, 988, 299. 245, 947

125, 141 revealability, 234, 236

promise, 146, 225 revelation/ Revelation, xi, 54, 78, 81, prototype, 168, 170 94, 100, 102, 108, 113-14, 116, 120, proximity, 67, 74, 80, 224 124, 128, 145, 146, 148, 151, 153,

156-58, 162, 171, 172, L74-77, 179, qnasi-transcendenial, 717, 79, 185, 186, 197, 233, 234, 235, 236, 241, 242 198, 223, 226, 236

sacrifice, 2,4, 78, 130, 192, 211, 212,

reappropriation, 205, 206, 225, 298 216, 217, 218, 219, 220, 221, 238 receive, 1], 3, 5,8, 15, 134, 135, 136, salvation, ix, x, 221 140, 164, 166, 176, 178, 181, 183, Same, the, £6

272 INDEX saying ‘Saying, 75, 76, 80; and mnasay- traditions: of mterpretation, 242

ug, G1: versus Said, 67 lransascendence, 60

secret, 3, 91, 111, 198, 211, 215, 220-r transcendence, 20, 32, 60, 62, 66, 67,

23, 226, 230, 232, 237-39 68, 70, 72, 77, 80, 84, 99, 102, 116,

selfgiving, 25, 116; God's, x—xi, 232; 118, 132, 137, 138, 148, 160, 181,

Selbsigegebenheit, 98 233, 236, 24?

slonilication, 9, 27, 34, 52, 61, 64, 66, transcendent, 20, 21, 36, 47, 60, 65, 71, 67, 72-76, 82, 96, 114, 142, 188, 191, 84, 101, 116, 137, 151, 189, 208, 209,

202: unthematized, 5? 226, 229, 238

singularity, 77, 211, 212, 256, 239 Transcendent, 70-72, 77-79, 226

spacing, 27, 44, 235 transcendental, 25, 28, 34, 39, 48, 49, subjectivity, 47, 58-65, 68, 72, 73, 83, 53, 64, 70, 71, 78, 79, 83, 84, 91, 92, O91, 101, 134, 149, 150, 151, 185, 190, 93,97, 101, 116, 122, 126, 140, 144,

225 145, 171, 185, 186, 196, 198, 223,

sublime, the, 145 226, 236, 239

subsntution, 65, 73, 150, 919 transcendentality, 76-78

| iranscendentals, 7}

leslimeny, 73, 230, 233, 236, 237 transcendental sionified, 70, 78

text, the, I94—-96, 200-207 truth, 4, 27, 33, 34, 36, 39, 40, 41, 51,

thanking, 31, 38° 54, 68, 105, 119, 127, 128, 153, 190, thanksgiving, 37 214, 928, 242: as adequation, 51, 60,

theology, 1x, x1, 23, 39, 46, 69, 71, 73, 198 78, 79, 98, 103, 104, 105, 113, 114,

in ea ne ie ar ae ie unconsciousness, 15; of gift, 14

Bey oO Ts ; b. ” ye _ ~ » aon undecidability, 7, 78, 80, 100, 112, 113, 180, 184, 189, 227, 228, 299, 230, 126. 136. 174. 181. 189. 189. 105

231, 939 933, 934 938 24], 249, tae one one ote oon 243, 244, 245, 246: and deconstruc- 197, 204, 209, ai 9, 226 | ; OOF. caeas “elaay any. undecidable, tion, 227; onto-thealogy, 161; 26, of ;72, wi80, tg 92, TE 95, 108, sift, 177; revealed, 137, 146, 156 135, 149, 150, 174, 175, 181. 183,

conhany newative TRO” 196, 197, 198, 199, 201, 205, 207,

totality, 56 |

theophany, negative, 160 908. 909. 917, 939. 937

there is, 58, 109, 11) yo ees

time, 32, 35, 120, 125, 187; gift of, 16 Ungrateful one, the, 130

totality of heing, 87, 88 withdrawal: giving as, 29, 35, 36, 41, urace/s, 10, 24, 44, 62, 66, 67, 71, 72, 109, 110, 112, 113, 117, 118, 231, 74, 75, 78, 79, 80, 1213, 1338, 144, 163, 244 168. L770 174, 175, 1960, 19h, 199, witness, 73, 79, 144, 145, 149, 157, 166,

193, 194, 195, 196, 199, 201, 262, 221, 231, 232, 236 203, 204, 205, 208, 210, 213, 220, word: as gift, 136, 149 226, 228, 231, 232, 233, 238, 247 world, the: as gift, 216